Appendix: Forensic Science Timeline

• Author: D. P. Lyle
• Pages: 383-388

Appendix: Forensic Science Timeline 383

APPENDIX: FORENSIC

SCIENCE TIMELINE

Prehistory: Early cave artists a nd pot makers “signed” their works with a

paint or impressed finger or thumbprint.

3500 BC: Mesopotamians per formed animal autopsies in order to commu-

nicate with divine forces

1000 BC: Chinese used fingerpri nts to “sign” legal documents.

3rd Century BC: Erasistratus and Herophilus performed the first autop-

sies in Alexandria.

1st Century AD: Emperor Claudius identified the severed head of his mis-

tress by recognizing her distinctive disc olored tooth.

2nd Century AD: Galen, physician to Roman g ladiators, dissected both

animal and human s to search for the causes of disease.

Ca. 1000: Roman attorney Quintilia n showed that a bloody handprint was

intended to frame a blind man for his mother’s murder.

1200s: First forensic autopsies done at the University of Bologna.

1247: Sung T’zu published The Washing Away of Sins, the first forensic

text.

1276: De Officia Coronatoris, which described the coroner’s duties, was

published in England.