David Sigmund Buettner

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Images of fossil shells from Büttner, Rudera diluvii testes , 1710, after the review in the Acta Eruditorum of 1711

David Sigmund Büttner , also David Sigismund Büttner , latinized David Sigefridus Buttnerus, (born August 30, 1660 in Lichtenstein / Sa. , † September 25, 1719 in Querfurt ) was a German Protestant clergyman and early geologist and paleontologist .

Life

Büttner was the son of the deacon David Büttner, went to school in Schneeberg (Ore Mountains) and continued his education in Zwickau with Christian Daum before he began studying theology in Leipzig in 1678 . His teachers there were Johann Adam Scherzer and Valentin Alberti and he was given access to Joachim Feller's private library . He experienced a plague epidemic in Leipzig and went to Jena in 1680 . He was a student and travel secretary of Caspar Sagittarius (historian) (1643–1694) and taught harp, poetry and rhetoric in Erfurt as a private teacher . Soon afterwards he fled again from the plague to Strasbourg and in 1683 returned to Mansfeld, where his father was dean general. In 1683 he became pastor in Stedten and then in Farrenstedt. In 1684 he married Anna Euphrosinia Sickel. From 1690 until his death in 1719 he was a deacon at St. Lamperti in Querfurt. He was known for his natural history cabinet and also as a preacher. He was in correspondence with scholars such as Georg Ernst Stahl , Johann Jakob Scheuchzer and the Altdorf medical professor Johann Jakob Baier (1677–1735). He was also in correspondence with August Hermann Francke , contributed exhibits to the natural history collection of the Francke orphanage in Halle and was involved in the pietism dispute of the Lutheran Church after 1700 , on which Francke advised him. After a sermon in which he criticized excessive Christmas customs, including theater performances, he was suspected of pietism and sued by his superior, superintendent and mayor Johannes Schwartze (1637-1725) at the consistory in Weißenfels.

After his death, his natural history cabinet was sold to the merchant Johann David Geysel in Nuremberg.

plant

Like his contemporary Nicolaus Steno, he interpreted fossils as the remains of marine creatures and considered them to be victims of the biblical flood (Diluvium), i.e. transported from there to another place. A view that was widespread at the time, however, held fossils in the tradition of Aristotle or Albertus Magnus for "nature games" , generated by the primal forces inherent in the mud or "seed-laden vapors" . Like Johann Jakob Scheuchzer and John Woodward , for example, Büttner was one of the Diluvians , forerunners of the Neptunists of the 18th century. Weathering phenomena and the rugged appearance of mountains such as the Greifensteine ​​in the Erzgebirge (made of granite), according to Büttner, indicated the violence of the Flood. The marine fossils that he found and described near Querfurt and the surrounding area also include corals (in the Ordovician and Silurian attachments, as well as chalk flints, which he believed to be corals), which he published in 1714. In his natural history cabinet, he juxtaposed recent marine creatures with their fossil counterparts.

In 1695 he reported on prehistoric urn finds in Liederstädt near Querfurt the year before .

Christian Polykarp Leporin wrote his necrology in 1719, drawing on handwritten notes by Büttner himself.

Fonts

  • Description of the corpse fire and death jugs / peculiarity of them / as in the year 1694. found in Lütherstädt near Qvernfurth. Zeitler, Halla 1695 ( digitized version ).
  • Rudera diluvii testes, ie signs and witnesses of the flood / With regard to the current state of our earth and water sphere / Particularity of the variously encountered animals and plants that were previously swamped / Bey looking at the light of natural whiteness. J. Fr. Braun, Leipzig 1710, ( digitized version ).
  • Coralliographia subterranea. Seu Dissertatio De Coralliis Fossilibus, In Specie De Lapide Corneo, Horn or Common Flint. F. Groschuff, Leipzig 1714, ( digitized ).

literature

  • Helmut Hölder: Geology and Paleontology. In texts and their history (= Orbis academicus. Problem stories of science in documents and presentations. 2: Natural science department. 11, ZDB -ID 191452-2 ). Alber, Freiburg (Breisgau) et al. 1960
  • Dietrich Hakelberg: “Pagan horrors and hideous corpse fire.” Archaeological practice and the pietism controversy with David Sigmund Büttner (1660–1719). In: Ulrich Heinen (Ed.): Which antiquity? Competing receptions of antiquity in the baroque (= Wolfenbütteler work on baroque research. 47, 1). Volume 1. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2011, ISBN 978-3-447-06405-7 , pp. 581-601, ( digitized version ).

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ For example, Johann Beer mentions a Palm Sunday sermon in the castle church of Weißenfels in 1696.
  2. ↑ Biographical data based on the article by Hakelberg, see literature.
  3. ↑ Büttner also published this in 1702 as anti-Christian Christ larvae in the printing works of the Francken orphanage in Halle.
  4. ↑ Woodward himself was very critical of colleagues, even if they agreed with him. He took Büttner's theories literally to be childish errors.
  5. ↑ Another early work on fossil corals comes from Scheuchzer in 1708.
  6. ↑ Christian Polycarp Leporin: The life of the scholars so in Germany From the beginning of the MDCCXIXth year this temporal blessed. Theil 7. Selbstverlag, Quedlinburg 1721, pp. 685-699 .
personal data
SURNAME Büttner, David Sigmund
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Büttner, David Sigismund
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Protestant clergyman and early geologist and paleontologist
DATE OF BIRTH August 30, 1660
PLACE OF BIRTH Lichtenstein / Sa.
DATE OF DEATH September 25, 1719
Place of death Querfurt