Erwin Balz
Erwin Otto Eduard von Bälz (born January 13, 1849 in Bietigheim , Kingdom of Württemberg , † August 31, 1913 in Stuttgart ) was a German internist, tropical medicine specialist and anthropologist. He was personal physician for the Japanese imperial family . With the surgeons Wilhelm Schultze and Julius Scriba , also from Germany, he founded modern medicine in Japan.
Life
Erwin Bälz grew up in the same house as the 3 years younger artist Gustav Schönleber . Bälz was the son of a building contractor (Carl Gottlob Friedrich Bälz, married to Wilhelmine Caroline (née Essig)), and brother of Karl von Bälz . He attended the Eberhard-Ludwigs-Gymnasium in Stuttgart . He began studying medicine at the age of 19 in Tübingen . After the Physikum, Bälz moved to Leipzig , where he completed his studies in 1872 and received his doctorate in the same year. In the same year he also began working as an assistant to Carl Reinhold August Wunderlich (1815–1877) and Ernst Leberecht Wagner (1829–1888), received his doctorate in Leipzig in 1872 and completed his habilitation there in 1876 with a thesis on acute rheumatoid arthritis . During his student days he was a member of the Germania Tübingen fraternity and worked as a field doctor during the war of 1870/71. During these years he learned a. a. Heinrich Botho Scheube know. In 1876 he was admitted to the Freemasons ' union and a member of the Stuttgart Lodge Wilhelm to the rising sun .
Through contacts with a Japanese patient, he was appointed as O-yatoi gaikokujin in 1876 for initially two years at the Tokyo Medical School (from 1877 the medical faculty of the University of Tokyo ) as the successor to the German doctor Agathon Wernichs (1843-1896). As a university teacher he stayed in Japan for almost 30 years and taught over 800 students in western medicine.
During his 29-year stay in Japan, Balz was not only active as a university professor. He was also consulted at meetings and consultations of the Japanese health department, he supervised the university clinic and also had his own practice.
His medical abilities required his appointment as an advisory court doctor in the 1890s and as the personal physician of the Crown Prince. In the summer of 1899 he visited the Korean capital Seoul and the port city of Busan and carried out ethnological studies. From April 22 to July 3, 1903 he was in Korea again and made an expedition into the interior of the country with Richard Wunsch . In 1902 Balz held his farewell lecture at the medical faculty of the University of Tokyo. He held his position as court doctor until his return home in 1905.
Back in Germany, Bälz also stopped his medical activity in order to devote himself to his anthropological studies. In 1907 he was elected the first chairman of the newly founded German Society for Tropical Medicine . His big project of writing a textbook about the people of East Asia was no longer possible because in 1910 he began to suffer from a vascular disease. He succumbed to this in 1913.
He married Hanako, a Japanese woman with whom he had two children. She lived in Germany until 1922, then withdrew in Tokyo, where she died on February 7, 1937.
Doctor, anthropologist and researcher
In the history of medicine, Erwin Bälz is considered to be the discoverer and researcher of as yet unknown diseases in East Asia. Bälz also brought German medicine to a high reputation in Japan through his many years of activity as a doctor and professor in Tokyo. Anthropology owes him important publications and research contributions on the cultures and people of East Asia. Furthermore, in Japan, Bälz is considered to be a pioneer of modern Japanese medicine, a proven friend of the Japanese people and, ultimately, a cultural mediator between Germany and Japan.
Due to its influence, health cards were kept in German in Japan until the mid-1970s. On his initiative, the volcanic springs of Kusatsu were expanded to become the most successful health resort in Japan today.
He also devoted himself to both anthropological and ethnological studies, which he carried out on his travels through Japan. His knowledge of Japanese made his anthropological and ethnological research work in Japan much easier. Both in the field of medicine (textbook of internal medicine, 1890) and in the field of ethnology and anthropology, Balz made important contributions. He promoted the Japanese way of life ( ju-jutsu , balneology ) and showed Japan a keen interest in art and poetry.
Balz was also a passionate art collector. A large part of his Japanese works of art is now exhibited in the Linden Museum in Stuttgart.
Appreciations
On his departure from Japan in 1905, Balz was awarded the “ Grand Cross of the Rising Sun ” by the Japanese Emperor .
In 1905 Erwin von Bälz was awarded the commentary cross of the Order of the Württemberg Crown , with which the personal title of nobility was associated.
In 1909 he became an honorary member of the Association for Patriotic Natural History in Württemberg .
In 1911 he was elected to the Leopoldina Scholars' Academy .
On February 27, 1937, a memorial plaque was unveiled at the house where he was born, and his son Erwin-Toku Bälz gave a lecture that was broadcast to Japan via shortwave radio. On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of his death, Olgastraße in Stuttgart-Degerloch was renamed after him on October 25, 1938 .
A stone sculpture at the clinic of the Eberhard Karls University in Tübingen commemorates his services to Japanese medicine. Since 1961 there has been a city partnership between Kusatsu and Bietigheim-Bissingen . In the Bietigheim-Bissingen City Museum there is a Bälz cabinet with exhibits on the life and work of the native Bietigheimer.
Erwin von Bälz and the martial arts
His passion for sport also led him into the world of Japanese martial arts. At the Imperial University of Tokyo , Erwin von Bälz promoted the ancient Japanese martial arts, mainly the Ju-Jutsu , which in his opinion was ideal for physical training. Together with two other doctors, Dr. Miyake and Dr. Julius Scriba, he was accepted into an existing team of the Ministry of Education, which had the task of integrating ju-jutsu for physical training in educational training. Whether he came across the young student Kanō Jigorō at the imperial university remains uncertain. The fact is that Kanō was at the imperial university at the same time and at the same time as Bälz was promoting his judo as a measure for physical training.
literature
- Erwin Bälz: The Life of a German Doctor in Awakening Japan. Diaries, letters, reports Ed. By Erwin Toku Bälz. J. Engelhorns Nachf., Stuttgart 1930
- Erwin Bälz: About the Japanese people's contempt for death. Edited by Erwin Toku Bälz. J. Engelhorns Nachf., Stuttgart 1936
- Max Watzka: Bälz, Erwin Otto Eduard von. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1953, ISBN 3-428-00182-6 , p. 520 f. ( Digitized version ).
- Eva Verma: Between Bietigheim and Tokyo. Erwin and Hana von Baeltz . In: "... wherever you come from". Binational couples through the millennia . Dipa, Frankfurt 1993, ISBN 3-7638-0196-0 , pp. 104–117 (with two photos)
- Frank Käser: On the establishment of conventional Japanese medicine in Japan during the Meiji period. History, decision, consequences . Saarbrücken 2008.
- Syd Hoare : The History of Judo . Yamagi Books, 1st edition 2009, ISBN 978-0-9560498-0-3
- Heiko Bittmann: Erwin von Baelz and his influence on physical education and traditional martial arts in Japan during the Meiji period . In: OAG Notes . No. 06/2010 , 2010, p. 10-50 .
- Heiko Bittmann: Erwin von Baelz and the physical exercises. Physical Education and Traditional Martial Arts in Meiji Period Japan . Verlag Heiko Bittmann, Ludwigsburg and Kanazawa 2010, ISBN 978-3-9807316-4-5
- Barbara I. Tshisuaka: Baelz, Erwin Otto Eduard von. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 129 f.
Web links
- Literature by and about Erwin Bälz in the catalog of the German National Library
- Newspaper article about Erwin Bälz in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .
- Overview of Erwin Bälz's courses at the University of Leipzig (winter semester 1874 to winter semester 1875)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b News of the OAG , No. 43 (1937), pp. 3-4.
- ↑ Court and State Manual of the Kingdom of Württemberg 1907, page 34
- ^ Honorary members of the Association for Patriotic Natural History in Württemberg
- ^ Member entry by Erwin von Baelz (with picture) at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on March 11, 2016.
- ↑ Nachrichten der OAG , No. 49 (1938), p. 9.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Balz, Erwin |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Bälz, Erwin von; Baelz, Erwin von |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German internist, anthropologist and personal physician to the imperial family and co-founder of modern medicine in Japan |
| DATE OF BIRTH | January 13, 1849 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Bietigheim-Bissingen |
| DATE OF DEATH | August 31, 1913 |
| Place of death | Stuttgart |