ABSTRACT
Wordy descriptions mention pain and pain management techniques, while visual representations, such as anatomical images, suggest impassibility and abstractness. Nature was for him a process of self-healing, which the surgeon's art must second, while learned surgery inflicts unnecessary pain by focusing on solid organs. Besides considering pain-a phenomenon of the body and of the soul, or the imagination-elements like patients' social status, political opportunity, and the practitioner's professional reputation must be taken into account in order to paint an accurate picture of pain management in sixteenth-century surgery. In his impassive expression, the representation of the Christian closely recalls the images of martyrs being tortured, such as those in a 1591 visual catalogue of martyrdom by the Oratorian friar Antonio Gallonio.
