Camillo Golgi’s contributions to the anatomic basis of sensitivity in tendons

Between 1878 and 1880 Camillo Golgi, professor of Histology and General Pathology at the University of Pavia, studiedthe termination of the nerves inside the tendons, near their muscular insertion. He defined two fundamental categories ofcorpuscles. The first type, which he called muscle-tendon terminal organs, was morphologically characterized by spindlestructures which at one end seemed to relate to the muscle fibers while at the other end they gradually merged with thetendon bundles. Golgi discovered that these structures received from one to four myelinated nerve fibers, which lost theirmyelin sheath as they entered the bundle, within which they divided dichotically, ending in a large number of terminalarborizations that had the appearance of reticular intertwines. In the superficial thickness of the tendon, near the muscle,Golgi also noticed a second category of corpuscles, which he described as claviform bodies or formations similar to Pacin-ian bodies. In 1890 Vittorio Mazzoni precisely defined their morphological characteristics. These corpuscles were latercalled Golgi muscle-tendon organs and Golgi-Mazzoni corpuscles. On the basis of their position and histological appear-ance, Golgi also correctly hypothesized their physiological role: to be receptors of muscular tension for the muscle-tendonorgans and transducers of sensitivity to touch and pressure for the Golgi-Mazzoni corpuscles.