Between Bouillaud and Broca: An unknown Italian debate on cerebral localization of language

• An Italian debate in mid-19th century about brain language localization is reported.
• Italian language-impaired patients were studied in light of Bouillaud’s claims.
• This Italian debate has been completely ignored in the history of aphasia.

From 1825 onward, Bouillaud began gathering clinical evidence to support the hypothesis that speech is located in the cerebral frontal lobes. His aim was to provide empirical proof to Gall’s theory of a specific substratum of speech in the anterior region of the brain. A well-known discussion ensued inside the French school among supporters and detractors that went far beyond Broca’s first report in 1861. Unknown is that Bouillaud’s investigations on localization of articulated language also gave rise to a discussion in Italy in the same period. In particular, speech localization formed a central topic in the mid-19th century in Northern Italy mainly thanks to four physicians, Michelangelo Asson, Mosè Rizzi, Gaetano Strambio and Filippo Lussana, who reported on language-impaired patients and approached these cases in the light of Bouillaud’s claims. Similarly to the French debate, the Italian medical community also included attacks and advocacies of the hypothesis of a precise localization of articulated language in the frontal lobes. However, they were mainly interested in investigating the anatomo-clinical relationships rather than in supporting Gall’s organology. This Italian debate appears to be the first to have developed in the mid-19th century outside that of the French community.