Under the skin of George Stubbs's The Anatomy of the Horse

This engraving comes from an extraordinary book the animal painter George Stubbs published in 1766. Stubbs dissected a horse in a lonely Lincolnshire farmhouse to learn its anatomy in detail: the illustrations of his discoveries make him the Leonardo da Vinci of the equine kingdom. In this image the horse has been flayed, revealing the muscles and arteries within. Stubbs portrays it with an eerie mixture of clinical precision and statuesque dignity, giving it a grandeur in death even as he analyses it scientifically. Illustration: Trustees of the British Museum