Juan Valverde de Amusco, Anatomia del corpo humano, Rome: A. Salamanca and A. Lafrery; Venice: N. Beuilacqua 1560, p. 64, engraving, plate size 21.1 x 15.1 cm, Keynes.T.7.11.

This is another image that does not appear in the Fabrica. This may well be something that was introduced by Gaspar Becerra (c. 1520-1568), a painter and sculptor who had worked in Rome and was influenced by Michelangelo’s painting style. This image of the surface muscles with the skin removed is reminiscent of Michelangelo’s St Bartholomew in the Sistine Chapel, in turn believed to be the artist’s self portrait.

Valverde reported in this work the pulmonary transit discovered with Colombo, but Valverde’s work was more conservative, and copied extensively images from the Fabrica, though adding a few variations, such as the use of classical armour and the Medici Venus. This image of the surface muscles with the skin removed is reminiscent of Michelangelo’s St Bartholomew in the Sistine Chapel, in turn believed to be the artist’s self portrait.