Anatomy of the European Mole

Galen (2) was the first to describe the mole's eyes.

2) Galen, On the Use of Parts, Book XIV, Chapter VI, says this about the eyes of the mole: "For what is inside in women is outside in men, a thing such as one may see in the eyes of moles. For they indeed have a vitreous humor, and a crystalline humor, and membranes around these, which we said grew from the meninges; and they possess these no less than animals that use their eyes. But they were not opened for them, nor did they advance outward, but were left imperfect in this way, preserved similar to those of others still in the womb." From this it seems to appear that all the ancients held this opinion up to the time of Galen. There is, however, a passage of Cicero (Academica, Book II, Chapter 25) from which Davies concluded that Cicero, being more perceptive than others, attributed sight to the mole. But this opinion of the most learned man rests on a reading that is by no means certain, which Goerenzius rightly challenged. It is likely that the ancients were familiar only with that one type of mole which Olivier observed in Asia, whose observation was confirmed by an eyewitness, Seetzen, in a letter sent to Blumenbach.