Carl Fraas

Carl Nikolaus Fraas (born September 6, 1810 in Rattelsdorf near Bamberg ( Kingdom of Bavaria ), † November 10, 1875 in Neufreimann near Munich) was a German agricultural scientist . As a scholar in numerous areas of agriculture, he was one of the most productive literary authors of his time. From 1847 he taught at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich . He developed a new teaching on soil fertility and wrote a seminal manual on the history of agricultural and forest science. He also made a name for himself as a botanist. Its official botanical author's abbreviation is " Fraas ".

Life path

Carl Nikolaus Fraas, son of a rent agent , studied philosophy and botany at the University of Bamberg , from 1830 medicine at the University of Munich , where he received his doctorate in 1834. med. received his doctorate . In 1835 he traveled to Athens as an educator with the Greek court marshal Friedrich von Saporta . In 1837 he became director of the Royal Court Gardens and the State Tree Nursery and at the same time professor of botany at the newly established University of Athens . In the same year he married Adelheid Voigt (1819–1889), the daughter of an Oldenburg court tailor, who was in Athens at the time.

In Athens Fraas became a dedicated botanist. He gave the lectures at the university in modern Greek. He worked out systematic overviews of the plants described in the classical writings of the Greeks and Romans. He also collected living plants in selected regions of Greece and created a herbarium . During this activity he discovered plant species that had not yet been described. Later the species Achillea fraasii Sch. Gdp. been named.

For health reasons, Fraas returned to Bavaria in 1842 and took on a teaching position for agriculture and natural history at the trade school in Freising . The herbarium sheets he brought with him from Greece are now in the Herbarium Zuccarini and in the herbarium of the Veterinary Faculty of the University of Munich .

In 1845 Fraas went to the Royal Central Agricultural School in Schleissheim as an inspector and teacher for chemistry and technology . In 1847 he accepted an appointment as an associate professor for agriculture at the political science faculty of the University of Munich . In 1851 he was appointed full professor. In 1852 he was also appointed director of the Royal Central Veterinary School in Munich . For almost two decades Fraas was one of the outstanding personalities in Bavarian agriculture. He was the last professor of agriculture at the University of Munich. From 1872 this subject was continued by the Technical University of Munich. Fraas spent the last years of his life on his estate in Neufreimann near Munich.

Lifetime achievement

At the university and at the veterinary school in Munich, Fraas represented the field of agricultural education across the board. He gave lectures in the fields of plant and animal production. Botanical exercises for identifying native plants were among his compulsory courses. At the university he also held a lectureship in economics . However, his close contact with agricultural practice was decisive for his successful work in Bavaria.

As early as 1847 Fraas took over the office of General Secretary of the Agricultural Association in Bavaria . In this function he was also the chief editor of the widespread Centralblatt of this association. Some innovations in Bavarian agriculture are based on his initiatives. He reorganized the guidelines for granting loans to farmers, promoted artificial fish farming and promoted silk production . It was also his idea to establish an independent state training institute for brewing in Weihenstephan .

As an experimenter, Fraas was mainly active in the field of agricultural chemistry . In 1855, the Agricultural Association in Bavaria, with the support of Justus von Liebig, set up an agricultural chemical test station in Munich . Fraas, entrusted with the management of this station, undertook several years of fertilization experiments with the aim of gaining better knowledge about the movement of nutrients in soils. In doing so, he improved the examination methods and for the first time used a lysimeter suitable for field experiments .

Together with Justus von Liebig and other shareholders, Fraas was involved in founding the first large Bavarian artificial fertilizer factory in Heufeld (today: Süd-Chemie , based in Munich). However, the professional relationship between Fraas and Liebig was very tense from the start. Since his own experimental test results on the effects of nitrogen fertilizers and test data from other agricultural chemists partly did not agree with the fertilizer theory advocated by Liebig, Fraas took a critical look at Liebig's teaching. There was a public personal dispute between the two scientists.

In the course of this partly emotional dispute, Fraas resigned his office as general secretary of the Agricultural Association in Bavaria in 1864 and largely withdrew from the public. On his retirement home, his estate in Neufreimann near Munich, he wrote several important books. However, he held his professorship for agricultural studies at the political science faculty of the University of Munich until his death in 1875.

Fraas made outstanding contributions to science and practice in agriculture as a specialist author . Through a large number of books and writings, he worked with his ideas far beyond the borders of Bavaria. His early major works include the books "Climate and Plant World" (1847), "The Nature of Agriculture" (1857) and the "Book of Nature for Agriculture" (1860). Particularly noteworthy is his book "Die Schule des Landbau" (1851), published with the support of the Agricultural Association in Bavaria and reprinted four times, which has been the authoritative textbook at Bavarian agricultural schools for over two decades.

Fraas dedicated three books to his new teaching on soil fertility, which he called "power culture". The core of this teaching is the creation of a high soil fertility through a regulated nutrient replacement economy and through the supply of the largest possible amounts of organic matter from plant and animal production. The titles of these three late works are: “Bavaria rediviva! A contribution to the doctrine of the end of the population through soil depletion ”(1865),“ The agricultural crises and their remedies. A contribution to the economic policy of arable farming ”(1866) and“ The root life of cultivated plants and the increase in yield ”(1870). The latter book is also considered an innovative work on root ecology . Fraas is here for the first time grouping cultivated plants according to the strength (digestion capacity for nutrients) of their root systems.

In the field of the history of science , Fraas has emerged with two extensive works: an award-winning publication on the “History of Agriculture in the Last 100 Years” (1852) and a “History of Agriculture and Forestry Science” (1865) with almost 700 printed pages. Both works, often criticized and yet unique in their wealth of information, are still considered important sources of documentation for historical research.

Fraas reveals his close connection to the peasantry in two small volumes entitled “Village Stories”. In a cheerful way, he tries to inspire young farmers for the profession of farmer with stories.

Major works

• Synopsis plantarum florae classicae or: Clear data on the plants occurring in the classical writings of the Greeks and Romans . Fleischmann, Munich 1845; 2nd edition Calvary, Berlin 1870.
• Climate and flora in time. A contribution to the history of both . Wölfle, Landshut 1847.
• Historical-encyclopaedic outline of agriculture theory . Franckh, Stuttgart 1848.
• The school of agriculture or easy to understand lessons in agriculture for agriculture schools, village schools and for self-teaching . Literary-Artistic Institution, Stuttgart 1851; 2nd ed. 1852; 3rd ed. 1858; 4th ed. 1862; 5th ed. 1871.
• History of agriculture or historical overview of the progress in agricultural knowledge in the last 100 years . Award-winning typeface. Calve, Prague 1852.
• Bavaria's cattle breeds, lofts and tribes. The XVI. Gathering of German farmers and foresters in Nuremberg as a festival album . Pössenbacher, Munich 1853.
• The artificial fish production according to the experiences of the artificial fish breeding establishment of the General-Comité of the agricultural association of Bavaria at the k. Central-Thierarzneischule in Munich . Literary-Artistic Institution Munich 1854; 2nd edition, ibid. 1854; 3rd edition, ibid. 1856.
• The nature of agriculture. Contribution to a theory of the same . Literarisch-Artistische Anstalt, Munich, 2 volumes, 1857. Vol. 1: Basics of agricultural crop production scientifically sorted according to the results of natural research ; Vol. 2: Fundamentals of agricultural animal production, scientifically sorted according to the results of natural research .
• Book of nature for agriculture or agricultural natural history . Literary and artistic establishment, Munich 1860.
• Bavaria rediviva! A contribution to the doctrine of the end of the population through soil depletion . Munich 1865.
• History of Agricultural and Forest Science. From the sixteenth century to the present . Literary-Artistic Institution, Munich 1865 = history of science in Germany. Modern times, third volume.
• The agricultural crises and their remedies. A contribution to the economic policy of arable farming . Brockhaus, Leipzig 1866.
• Village stories. A reader for agricultural training schools . Fleischmann, Munich 1869: Vol. II, ibid. 1870.
• The root life of the cultivated plants and the increase in yield . Paul Kormann, Leipzig 1870; 2nd edition, ibid. 1872.

literature

• William Löbe:  Karl Fraas, Professor of Agriculture . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1877, p. 202 f.
• Heinz Haushofer : Carl Fraas. Origin and work of a Franconian farmer in the 19th century (= family history writings of the Society for Family Research in Franconia. H. 6). Nuremberg 1941 (with picture and list of scriptures).
• Hans room : Carl Fraas. A literary-historical life picture from the middle of the 19th century. At the same time a contribution to the history of plant nutrition and fertilizer theory. In: Bavarian Agricultural Yearbook. Vol. 32, 1955, pp. 361-380.
• Hans Raum: Supplements to Carl Fraas and the history of agricultural university teaching. In: Bavarian Agricultural Yearbook. Vol. 34, 1957, pp. 121-126.
• Heinz Haushofer:  Fraas, Carl Nikolaus, farmer. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, ISBN 3-428-00186-9 , p. 308 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Fritz Andreas Zehetmair: Carl Nikolaus Fraas (1810-1875). A Bavarian agronomist and reformer of intensive agriculture (= Miscellanea Bavarica Monacensia. Vol. 151). Uni-Druck, Munich 1995 (dissertation, Technical University Munich, 1993; with numerous illustrations and complete bibliography).
• Gerhard J. Bellinger , Brigitte Regulator-Bellinger : Schwabings Ainmillerstrasse and its most important residents. A representative example of Munich's city history from 1888 to today. 2nd Edition. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2012, ISBN 978-3-8482-2883-6 , pp. 119–121.

Web links

• Literature by and about Carl Fraas in the catalog of the German National Library
• Author entry and list of the described plant names for Carl Fraas at the IPNI