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Berthold Hatschek was born in Moravia (now the Czech
Republic) and he spent the most productive years of his life
as a professor of zoology in Prague (1885-1896). As it was
believed at that time that the annelids, especially their
younger developmental stages, are closely related and
possibly ancestral to vertebrates, he studied their ontogeny.
However, he soon turned his attention to larval tunicates
and especially to Amphioxus, and compared their anatomy with
the most primitive recent vertebrate, which is the larval
cyclostome Ammocoetes. His carefully prepared illustrations
of larval Amphioxus are used in various textbooks until
today. Hatschek believed that by comparisons of Ammocoetes
with larval Amphioxus and with larval tunicates, he can
reconstruct the anatomical structure of an ancestor of
vertebrates.
Since Hatschek’s time an immense progress was made in search for early vertebrates and their ancestors, not only in Hatschek’s own field (comparative developmental morphology), but also in astonishing palaeontological discoveries of “Amphioxus-like“ chordates and in the field of molecular biology. We decided to organize this symposium not only to celebrate Hatschek’s anniversary but mainly because we would like to bring together specialists from different branches of biology (including palaeobiology) to discuss the current view on the topics tackled by Hatschek some 150 years ago. We believe that the meeting in the historical building where Hatschek made a great deal of his studies may provide an inspirative background for mutual exchange of ideas and for a way to common view of the complex topic of vertebrate origin, eventually.
Drawing of a hypothetical ancestor of vertebrates by Haeckel (1874) illustrates level of knowledge at the time when Hatschek commenced his scientific career.
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