Andrew Plummer

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Andrew Plummer (born September 23, 1697 (according to other sources 1698 ), † April 16, 1756 in Edinburgh ) was a Scottish medic and chemist. From 1726 to 1755 he was Professor of Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh .

life and work

Andrew Plummer was the son of Gavin Plummer, a merchant and councilor and treasurer of his parish, and his wife Elisabeth. Andrew had three siblings, Joannet, Elisabeth and Jean, who were all born with him within four years.

Plummer attended the Arts curriculum of the University of Edinburgh from 1712 to 1717, but did not graduate there. Then he began his medical training in Edinburgh but finished it in Leyden . So he enrolled on September 5, 1720 to study medicine at the University of Leyden ( Netherlands ). Plummer finished his studies with a medical degree in Leyden on Thursday, July 23, 1722. The title of his doctoral thesis was Dissertatio medica inauguralis de phthisi pulmonali à catarrho orta .

He returned to Scotland on February 25, 1724 and passed his exam at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh . This qualification was imperative to practice as a doctor in Edinburgh. On November 3, 1724 he was accepted together with the doctors Andrew Sinclair (1726-1757), John Innes (1726-1755) and John Rutherford as a member of the Royal College. Plummer, Rutherford, Sinclair and Innes bought a house at the end of Robertson's Close about 100 meters from the university, where they gave lectures and established a laboratory.

In chemistry he created considerations about attractive and repulsive forces that are involved in the creation of chemical bodies ( chemical affinity ). These ideas influenced his successors William Cullen and Joseph Black .

Plummer's pills

He developed the so-called "Plummers pills" (" Plummer's pills "), a mixture of calomel and antimony sulfide with guaiac . The pills were originally used to treat psoriasis , and later also for anti-syphilitic therapy.

In The Book of Health. A compendium of domestic medicine. (London, 1828) there are instructions for the preparation of Plummer's pills . The following recipe is described:

“(…) Dr Plummer's pills. Take of calomel, fifteen grains; precipitate sulfurate of antimony, fifteen grains; gum guaiacum, half a drachm: rub them in a mortar together for ten minutes, then, with a little conserve, form then into fifteen pills. On to be taken every night and morning. (...) "

- The Book of Health. A compendium of domestic medicine. London 1828, p. 102. (books.google.de)

Works (selection)

  • Dissertatio medica inauguralis de phthisi pulmonali à catarrho orta. 1722, OCLC 14334005 .
  • Remarks on chemical solutions and precipitations. G. Hamilton and J. Balfour, Edinburgh 1754.
  • Experiments on neutral salts, compounded of different acid liquors, and alcaline salts, fixt and volatile. G. Hamilton and J. Balfour, Edinburgh 1754.

literature

  • Andrew Cunningham, Roger French: The Medical Enlightenment of the Eighteenth Century. Cambridge University Press, 1990, ISBN 0-521-38235-1 , p. 57. (books.google.de)
  • D. Doyle: Edinburgh doctors and their physic gardens. In: JR Coll Physicians Edinb. Volume 38, 2008, pp. 361-367. (rcpe.ac.uk , PDF; 450 kB)
  • CC Booth: William Hillary a Pupil of Boerhaave. In: Medical history. Volume 7, October 1963, pp. 297-316, ISSN  0025-7273 . PMID 14071955 . PMC 1034869 (free full text).
  • Douglas Guthrie: The influence of the Leyden school upon Scottish medicine. In: Medical history. Volume 3, Number 2, April 1959, pp. 108-122, ISSN  0025-7273 . PMID 13643145 . PMC 1034462 (free full text).
  • G. Hull: The influence of Herman Boerhaave. In: Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine. Volume 90, Number 9, September 1997, pp. 512-514, ISSN  0141-0768 . PMID 9370992 . PMC 1296534 (free full text).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Andrew Plummer (1697-1756). University of Edinburgh , accessed March 9, 2017 .
  2. ^ John E. Mackenzie: The chair of chemistry in the University of Edinburgh in the XVIIIth and XIXth centuries. In: J. Chem. Educ. Volume 12, No. 11, 1935, p. 503, doi: 10.1021 / ed012p503 .
  3. ^ Richard M. Swiderski: Calomel in America: Mercurial Panacea, War, Song and Ghosts. BrownWalker Press, 2009, ISBN 978-1-59942-467-5 , p. 113.
  4. ↑ Robert Sept.Peart: The indigestibility Of Plummer's Pills. In: The Lancet. Vol. 169, No. 4349, p. 52, 6 July 1907. doi: 10.1016 / S0140-6736 (01) 10823-8
personal data
SURNAME Plummer, Andrew
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Scottish doctor, chemist
DATE OF BIRTH September 23, 1697 or 1698
DATE OF DEATH April 16, 1756
Place of death Edinburgh