The part shown as (2) in the illustration is the “posterior speech cortex,” or
Wernicke’s area. Carl Wernicke was a German doctor who, in the 1870s, reported
that damage to this part of the brain was found among patients who had speech
comprehension difficulties. This finding confirmed the left hemisphere location of
language ability and led to the view that Wernicke’s area is part of the brain crucially
involved in the understanding of speech.