Pecquet, John

, a learned anatomist, and a native of Dieppe, a considerable author of the seventeenth century, has rendered his name famous by his discovery of the thoracic duct, and the receptacle of the chyle; with which, however, some alledge that Bartholomeus Eustachius was acquainted before him. But the world is obliged to Pecquet for shewing, beyond all contradiction, that the lacteal vessels convey the chyle to this receptacle; and for proving that it is thence carried, by particular vessels, through the thorax, almost as high as the left shoulder, and there thrown into the left subclavian vein, and so directly carried to the heart. He died at Paris, in February 1674. The work in which he published the discovery was entitled “Experimenta nova Anatomica, quibus incognitnm hactenus Chyli Receptaculum, et ab eo per Thoracem in Kamos usque subclavios Vasa lactea deleguntur;” to which was subjoined a dissertation, “De Circulatione Sanguinis et Chyli Motu,” 1651. It was reprinted in 1654, together with an essay “De Thoracis lacteis,” in answer to Kiolan and many subsequent editions have appeared. ²