Carl Koch (geologist)

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Carl Jakob Wilhelm Ludwig Koch (1827–1882) .jpg
Grave of Carl Koch in the north cemetery in Wiesbaden

Carl Koch (born June 1, 1827 in Heidelberg , † April 18, 1882 in Wiesbaden ) was a German natural scientist and royal Prussian state geologist .

Live and act

Carl Koch was born as the eldest son of the inn owner zum Carlsberg and his wife Wilhelmine Haas. After his father died prematurely in 1831, his uncle Ludwig Haas, a mine and hut owner from Dillenburg , became his guardian. His mother, his two years younger brother Ludwig Koch and he stayed in Heidelberg until 1844, so that Carl received his school and high school education up to the prima level . On the advice of his uncle, Koch embarked on a career in mining . In 1844 he carried out a course in practical mining work under his direction and was able to complete his high school education at the Am Löhrtor high school in Siegen in 1845 .

At Easter 1846 he moved to the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg , where he was active in the Corps Nassovia. In 1848 he moved to the Philipps University of Marburg , where he also joined the Corps Teutonia Marburg . In 1849/50 he finally went to the Hessian Ludwig University . There he became a member of the Corps Rhenano-Nassovia.

He focused on the natural sciences , especially physics and chemistry ; however, at the request of his mother and at the urging of his uncle, he was to pursue a practical career. Before moving on to this, he undertook a major trip through Switzerland and the Tyrolean Alps in 1852 and came to Italy a little later . Here he dealt with botany , mineralogy and geognosy for the first time .

When he returned, his former teacher, Karl Caesar von Leonhard, found him a job where he supervised the gypsum pits on the Neckar below Heilbronn , which at the time were owned by the Counts of Reichenbach-Lessonitz. His first major literary essays, which deal with the Triassic and gypsum construction on the Baden Neckar and appeared in Gustav Leonhard's "Contributions to the mineralogical and geognostic knowledge of the Grand Duchy of Baden", also fall during this period . A little later he took over the position of director of the Kinzigtaler Bergwerk-Verein, an English company that owned silver mines near Schapbach . After his marriage on April 3, 1853 to Sophie Göbel, daughter of the already deceased owner of the Burger Eisenwerke, he moved with her to Dillenburg in 1854 and took over the technical management of a large number of iron stone pits and the Scheldt works there in 1855, which he, however, as a result of the Great Depression between 1867 and 1869 had to sell completely.

In the fall of 1867 he became a temporary teacher of mineralogy, geology, physics, chemistry and mathematics at the mountain school in Dillenburg. After the Provincial College in Kassel confirmed its Facultas Docendi for the two upper classes of a secondary school on November 13, 1869 , he took up the position of teacher for mathematics and natural sciences at the "Teaching Institute of Israelite Religious Studies" on November 25, 1869 Society in Frankfurt am Main ”. In addition to his normal workload, he also taught at other schools, gave private tuition and prepared technical reports. In 1869 he became a member of the Association for Scientific Entertainment in Frankfurt am Main, where he served as President in 1871 and 1872, and on January 22, 1870 a member of the Senckenberg Society for Natural Research in Frankfurt am Main .

Geological collection in the Wiesbaden Museum

In 1872 he moved to Wiesbaden , where he temporarily held the teaching position for natural sciences at the Hof Geisberg agricultural school from October 1, 1872. It was definitely not discontinued until November 29, 1873. On May 14th of the same year he was appointed royal geologist of the Prussian Geological State Institute , while maintaining his residence in Wiesbaden. In the following years he worked mainly on the mapping of the Taunus and the Cenozoic formations on its slopes and feet as far as the Rhine and Main.

Despite his residence in Wiesbaden, he continued to give lectures in Frankfurt, supported by the Senckenberg Society. He lectured "on geology with special consideration of the area around Frankfurt" (winter semester 1867/77), "on geognosy and palaeontology of the older mountain formations with special consideration of the Taunus" (winter semester 1878/79) and "on Mesozoic strata, especially the Mainz Basin and the Diluvial Formations ”(WS 1879/80).

From 1879 his work was interrupted several times due to physical suffering. A trip to Switzerland made in 1881 with his wife Sophie also brought no improvement. He died before the age of 55 and was buried on April 20 in the north cemetery in Wiesbaden. He left three daughters and one son.

plant

Panel from the essentials of the chiropters etc.

The first structure of the layers of the Rhenish Lower Devon based on stratigraphic and palaeontological observations is due to Carl Koch. In the field of paleontology, he immersed himself in the Homalonotidae , a family of trilobites . In his first article "on the occurrence of Homalonotus species in the Rhenish Lower Devonian" (1880) he describes, among other things, Parahomalonotus mutabilis . His larger work, which he could no longer complete due to his death, is the "Monograph of the Homalonotus Species of the Rhenish Lower Devonian" , edited by Emanuel Kayser in 1883. In it he fundamentally revised the results of Roemer and Sandberger and took the first descriptions from Digonus ornatus , Digonus rhenanus , Homalonotus scabrosus , Wenndorfia multicostata and Wenndorfia plana .

In addition to geology and paleontology, zoology took up a large part of his work spectrum. In the early years of his scientific activity, he was mainly concerned with bats . Among them are his writings "Die Fledermäuse (Chiropteren) Oberhessens and the bordering provincial parts" (1860), "The essentials of the chiropterans with a special description of the bats occurring in the Duchy of Nassau and the adjacent parts of the state " (in the yearbooks of the Nassau Association for Natural History 1862 / 63), "the chiroptera fauna of the Pollichia region " (1863) and his lecture on "the way of life of the native bats" on January 8, 1869 in the Senckenberg Natural Research Society.

Later he also worked on the topic of arachnids , about which he wrote the "Contributions to the knowledge of the Opilionidae of the Central Rhine area" (1871). From the materials of a trip financed by the Rüppell Foundation by Georg Hermann Grenacher and Friedrich Carl Noll to Tenerife in September 1871, he edited the "Contributions to the knowledge of the arachnids of the Canary Islands" (1872), whereupon the "Contributions to the knowledge of the arachnids north -Afrikas “ (1872/73), from the material of Karl von Fritsch's and Johannes Justus Rein's journey in the spring of 1872, followed.

Honors

Monument to Carl Koch in Wiesbaden's Nerotal, created by the sculptor Hermann Schies

In recognition of his work, the snail species Rhinoclavis kochi , Lataxiena kochiana and Calliostoma kochi as well as the cephalopod Sepiadarium kochii were named after him. Due to his activity as an advisor to the city of Wiesbaden on issues of drinking water supply and state geology, there is a monument in the Upper Nerotal ▼ in Wiesbaden. In 1874 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Blue Book of the Corps Teutonia Marburg 1825 to 2000, p. 68
  2. ↑ a b Kösener corps lists 1910, 166 , 262; 56 , 366
  3. ↑ Otto Follmann : About the Lower Devonian layers near Coblenz . In. Program of the Royal High School in Coblenz. School year 1890-91. Coblenz 1891. pp. 3-37.
  4. ^ Sandford, AC (2005): Homalonotid trilobites from the Silurian and Lower Devonian of south-eastern Australia and New Zealand (Arthropoda: Trilobita: Homalonotidae). Memoirs of Museum Victoria 62 (1) p. 1-66.
  5. ↑ Base, M. & Franke, C. (2006): Marine Faunas from the early Unteremsium (Unterdevon) of the Givonne-Oesling-Antiklinorium (Luxembourg). Ferrantia 46 p. 7-41.
  6. ↑ Tjärnö Marine Biological Laboratory: Biographical Etymology of Marine Organism Names. K

Web links

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personal data
SURNAME Koch, Carl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Koch, Carl Jacob Wilhelm Ludwig (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German naturalist
DATE OF BIRTH June 1, 1827
PLACE OF BIRTH Heidelberg
DATE OF DEATH April 18, 1882
Place of death Wiesbaden