preformationism

Updated: June 20, 2025

Many embryological investigations were performed during the eighteenth century, but most relate to the controversy regarding epigenesis and preformationism as the true expression of embryonic development. Withal, the seventeenth-century embryologists, and particularly the embryologists of seventeenth-century England, had contributed much to the progress of the discipline.

Charles W. Bodemer - Medical Investigation in Seventeenth Century England: Papers Read at a Clark Library Seminar, October 14, 1967

For even as the studies of Mayow were in progress, embryology was embarked upon a course leading to preformationism. By the end of the seventeenth century, the idea that the embryo was encased in miniature in either egg or sperm was elevated to a position of Doctrine, and thereafter there was little encouragement to quantitative study of development.

Charles W. Bodemer - Medical Investigation in Seventeenth Century England: Papers Read at a Clark Library Seminar, October 14, 1967