The particularly good reception enjoyed by our "The Human Central Ner vous System, a Synopsis and Atlas" has made a second edition necessary, hardly more than two years after its first appearance: This new edition enabled us to make a number of corrections, but it was judged premature to undertake a thorough updating of the text. However, a major improvement - suggested by some reviewers and many colleagues - is that in this new edition the abbreviations in the figures have been replaced by the full Latin terms. We want to emphasize that the study of this book can facilitate and deepen but never replace the study of the anatomical preparation. Acquaintance and histology of nervous tissue has been taken for with the basic cytology granted. This book is evidently often consulted with the aim of looking up a particular and its topographical relations. This cer structure together with its name is tainly one of the purposes of the book. We are, however, of the opinion that during a systematic study of the figures showing the functional systems in part IV, perusal of the accompanying text will be necessary. As a matter of fact the spatial representations of the fibre systems are no more than a visualization of the most salient features discussed in the text. The pictures are so to speak a snapshot of the current knowledge of a particular functional system within the central nervous system; no less, but no more either.
