Friedrich Gabriel Sulzer

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Friedrich Gabriel Sulzer (born October 10, 1749 in Gotha , † December 14, 1830 in Altenburg ) was a German doctor and naturalist (zoologist, mineralogist).

His father Johann Caspar Sulzer (1716–1799) came from a family of doctors in Winterthur and was a pioneer of smallpox vaccination in Gotha, which, however, still used the real smallpox pathogen. He was successful and even vaccinated the Duke of Saxe-Gotha and his family. Sulzer studied medicine in Göttingen and Strasbourg and settled in Göttingen in 1768. Then he was back in Gotha and undertook a study trip abroad (England, France, Holland) from 1771 to 1773, where he studied disease control and veterinary medicine in particular. In 1774 he published a book on hamsters and in 1775 an essay on rinderpest.

From 1775 he was a resident doctor in Gotha and at the same time director of the veterinary school in Ronneburg, founded in 1774 at his suggestion . In 1779 he officially became a well doctor in Ronneburg, a post that he had previously held on a provisional basis in the spa. He was also director of the midwifery training institute in Altenburg. In 1781 he became Hofmedicus, Hofrat in 1784 and Privy Councilor in Saxony-Gotha in 1818. He had a good reputation as a doctor and surgeon who also treated poor patients.

Sulzer was a mineral collector and exchanged views on this with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , whom he had known at least since 1797 and met in Karlsbad in 1807, among others . They were in correspondence. He was also the personal physician of the Duchess Dorothea von Kurland, who resided in Löbichau , and her stepsister Elisa von der Recke . He often traveled with both of them to Karlsbad to take a cure. In 1813 he treated the wounded Theodor Körner in Karlsbad . He was friends with Christoph August Tiedge .

Sulzer was married twice but had no children.

In 1791 he named the mineral strontianite after its place of discovery Strontian in Scotland. During the analysis he worked with Johann Friedrich Blumenbach . Like two Scottish doctors and scientists ( William Cruickshank , Adair Crawford ) he came to the conclusion that it contained a new element ( strontium ).

Fonts

  • Attempt of a natural history of the hamster, Gotha: Dieterich 1774

literature

  • Gustav Wolf: Friedrich Gabriel Sulzer, Altenburger history and house calendar, Altenburg: E. Reinhold Verlag, 2004, online
  • Hans Petzsch: The human doctor Dr. FG Sulzer and his Ronneburger Vieharzneiinstitut, German Medical Journal, Volume 20, 1969, 123–126

References and comments

  1. ↑ Sulzer, About the Strontianite, a Scottish Fossil that also appears to contain a new ground earth, Bergmännisches Journal, 1791, pp. 433-436.
  2. ^ Strontianite, Mindat
personal data
SURNAME Sulzer, Friedrich Gabriel
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German doctor and naturalist (zoologist, mineralogist)
DATE OF BIRTH October 10, 1749
PLACE OF BIRTH Gotha
DATE OF DEATH December 14, 1830
Place of death Altenburg