The advent of modern brain surgery: 100 years since William Macewen

The year 2024 marks one hundred years since the death of the “Father of Modern Brain Surgery”: Sir William Macewen. Unbeknownst to many, the epithet derives from his uncanny ability to conjoin clinical data and anatomical knowledge, to be able to perform accurate localization of intracranial disease and its treatment, as earlier as 1876. Working before the advent of the X-Rays and modern neuroimaging, he published the Atlas of Head Sections, an unsurpassed guide for sectional anatomy of the head. Among his numerous contributions, the authors emphasize images of this publication and its continuing impact to brain and skull base micro and endoscopic surgery.