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Health

Michelangelo's 'The Flood' seems to depict a woman with breast cancer

The Renaissance artist Michelangelo had carried out human dissections, which may have led him to include women with breast cancer in some of his pieces

By James Urquhart

30 October 2024

A section of Michelangelo's 'The Flood' depicting a woman with suspected breast cancer

A woman in “The Flood” shows signs of breast cancer, such as lumps

GRANGER – Historical Picture Archive/Alamy

Michelangelo appears to have depicted a woman with breast cancer in his fresco The Flood on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, which may have been a message on the inevitability of death.

Researchers have previously identified signs of breast cancer – including swelling and skin retraction – in his sculpture Night, dated around 1526 to 1533.

Now, Raffaella Bianucci at the University of Paris-Saclay in France and her colleagues…

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