Anthropodermic bibliopegy performed, or collected by medical doctors, who have access to cadavers, sometimes those of executed criminals, such as the case of John Horwood in 1821 and the Red Barn Murder in 1828. Another tradition, with less supporting evidence, is that books of erotica or the occult have been bound in human skin. The Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh preserves a notebook bound in the skin of the murderer William Burke after his execution and subsequent public dissection by Professor Alexander Monro in 1829. What Lawrence Thompson called "the most famous of all anthropodermic bindings" is exhibited at the Boston
Sociopolitical issues of anatomy in America in the 19th century US similarly sought to set the medical profession apart from alternative medicine and other rivals through increased anatomical studies. As a result, the demand for corpses by medical students for dissection studies grew, which in turn propelled widespread medical grave-robbing, social strife and legislative changes to provide anatomists with legal supplies of cadavers. Medical grave robbery prompted anatomy riots in nearly every medical institution and drove changes in legislatures. The increase in importance of anatomy in medical studies also increased society's interest in the human body, which prompted the popularization of anatomy museums. The societal funerary obligation to respect the