A romantic history attaches to this fine collection of plates, drawn by Eustachius himself and completed in 1552. They remained unprinted and forgotten in the Vatican Library until discovered in the early 18th century, and were then presented by Pope Clement XI to his physician, Giovanni Maria Lancisi. The latter published them in 1714 together with his own notes. These copperplates are more accurate than the work of Vesalius. Singer was of the opinion had they appeared in 1552 Eustachius would have ranked with Vesalius as one of the founders of modern anatomy. He discovered the Eustachian tube, the thoracic duct, the adrenals and the abducens nerve, and gave the first accurate description of the uterus. He also described the cochlea, the muscles of the throat and the origin of the optic nerves. Plate XVIII is a drawing of the sympathetic nervous system. Eustachius was the first to describe the ganglion chain, but made the mistake of tracing the origin of the cervical portion to the brain-stem. With respect to dentistry, Eustachi's illustrations of the teeth, related to his Libellus de dentibus (1563-64) were first published in this work.