Johann Friedrich Erdmann

Johann Friedrich Erdmann

Johann Friedrich Erdmann (born July 18, 1778 in Wittenberg , † January 28, 1846 in Wiesbaden ) was a German medic .

Life

Wittenberg time

Johann Friedrich Erdmann was born as the son of the archdeacon and master's degree Johann Christoph Erdmann . The bright boy received lessons from his father and his brother ten years older than him, in the basic subjects and his first Latin exercises. At the Latin school he expanded his knowledge and was qualified to attend the university in his hometown.

In 1795 Erdmann began studying theology with a focus on church history; a year later he switched to medical school. Doctor of Medicine he received his doctorate in 1802. The title of his dissertation was "Utrum aqua per electricitatem columnae a cel. Volta inventae in elementa sua dissolvatur? ". It was forty pages in quart. This work already shows how much he was attracted to the theory of polarity, which he further developed in the course of his life and "in which he recognized the mysterious agent that animates our organism", as a biographer later put it.

After graduating, he went on trips, including coming to Vienna , where he heard from Peter Frank. In 1804 Erdmann completed his habilitation as extraordinary. Professor of the history of medicine and until 1808 taught pathology and therapy at the famous Alma mater Wittenbergensis as a full professor , he also practiced as a district and state physician . The latter activity required personal commitment from him under difficult conditions. During this time he joined the Apollo Masonic Lodge in Leipzig in 1809 .

Napoleon oppressed the inhabitants of the fortress town of Wittenberg from 1806 , which then fell to Prussia after the Congress of Vienna in 1815 . In 1817 the order came from Potsdam to close the university and to merge it with the University of Halle / Saale . Many Wittenberg lecturers transferred to other universities before the dissolution or they followed the call of a university abroad. At that time, Erdmann was constantly troubled by the procurement of funds that would serve to expand the clinical outpatient clinic he was head of . When that became too much for him, he took a vacation, toured Northern Italy, Switzerland and also visited Paris . When the trouble with the fundraising continued in Wittenberg afterwards, he did not hesitate any longer and in turn accepted the offer at the newly founded university of the Tatar provincial capital Kazan .

Kazan time

In March 1810 he arrived in the little Volga town and was appointed to one of the most important chairs of the newly founded university: the chair for pathology, therapy and clinic. In 1811 he submitted a detailed plan to the responsible bodies for the construction of a clinic with three departments (therapeutic, surgical and gynecological). This plan was approved by the Advisory Commission. E. was awarded the grateful appreciation by the responsible curator (the state commissioner for teaching). However, when it came to implementation (immediately 6000 rubles were needed, and 5000 rubles annually for operation) the project was postponed indefinitely. For 7 years E. tried to get the necessary financial means without success. He had to limit himself to the use of the clinical material offered by the general and university hospitals under his direction. The passionate traveler, who had already traveled to France, Italy and Switzerland before his time in Kazan, also undertook numerous expeditions from Kazan with a variety of destinations. On his journeys he examined all phenomena that interested him as a specialist. At the same time, he carefully observed the various forms of Russian life. In 1811 he described the mode of action of the Sergeiev mineral springs after he had chemically analyzed them in great detail. In 1812 he examined the sulfur springs in the vicinity of the city of Tetjuschi . In 1813 E. visited the ruins of the ancient city of Bolgar with Professor Frea , which he described in a remarkable treatise. The so-called fever epidemic also fell in 1813. During this time he volunteered as a doctor to fight this epidemic. Until his departure in 1817 (he was meanwhile 1st dean of the medical faculty of Kazan) he held other important positions in addition to his work as a university professor. He acted as a school visitator for the governorates of Saratov , Simbirsk , Astrakhan and Perm as well as Tobolsk . In addition to the conscientious execution of his official business, he still found time to deal in detail with the country and its people, to study their customs and traditions and to observe special diseases. These findings were reflected in a three-volume work: "Contributions to the Knowledge of Inner Russia". The first volume is solely the description of the med. and topographical conditions of the Kazan Governorate and has its own meaning.

Since Erdmann did not speak the national language, he gave his lectures at the university in Latin . He was placed in charge of the Kazan therapeutic clinic and appointed as a doctor at the grammar school. In addition, he ran a private practice. But in the long run he couldn't stand the climate of the area; a gouty-rheumatic disease undermined his creative power. When the decision to return to Germany had already been made, he was offered a position at the University of Dorpat (Tartu). He left Kazan in 1817; a year later, the Senate of Kazan University made him an honorary member.

Dorpater time

At the Dorpater University, which has existed since 1632 - the "head of Estonia" - Doctor Erdmann took up his duties as a full professor of pathology , semiotics , therapy and clinics . In addition, he only ran a modest private practice, albeit larger research and writing. Because his state of health did not improve in Dorpat either, after five years of successful work he left the site and went on vacation to Saxony, where from 1823 he became royal Saxon personal physician and court and medical councilor in Dresden for four years . He did not like the court service. He decided to travel to Dorpat one more time.

Regardless of a heart defect that has since been discovered, he expanded his activities and became a professor of dietetics , medicine, and the history of medicine. It was a special honor for him to represent the Dorpater Hochschule at the bicentenary of the University of Helsingfors ( Helsinki ). For eight years he did an enormous job as dean of the medical faculty, head of the professors' institute and founder of the pharmacological collection. Progressive illness forced him to retire in 1842. The scientist left Russia with great honor and, hoping for some relief from his suffering, chose Wiesbaden am Rhein as his residence, where he died on January 28, 1846.

Scientific achievements

Erdmann is one of the lecturers who have the reputation of the Wittenberg University, who have carried excellent scientific work across national borders, as a representative of thorough and all-encompassing scholarship. He has written over 40 scientific publications, for example on club feet in newborns, on intermittent fever and on his specialty, polarization theory .

Fonts

• Contributions to the knowledge of the interior of Russia . Riga / Leipzig 1822–1826. 2 volumes ( digitized volume 2.1 from the holdings of the Institute for East and Southeast European Research ).
• Experiments on the decomposition of water through Volta's column . Gilbert's Annals of Physics 1802 Vol. XI. N 6)
• Description of two by Dr. Brunner in Vienna invented voltaic-electrical apparatus to discover the apparent death and to revive the apparent death . Ibid. 1802 Vol. XII No. 7
• Description of some new voltaic-electrical devices . Ibid. 1802 vol. 12
• Observation of the terrestrial refraction of rays in the Saratov and Astrakhan governorates . Ibid., Vol. 57
• Galvanic experiments, employed in the Vienna madhouse . Horn's archive for med. Experience. 1804 vol. VI issue 1
• Description of an improved bandage . Ibid issue 2
• Comments on intermittent fever and its cure . Ibid. Vol. I issue 2
• Contributions to forensic medicine . Ibid. Vol. III issue 1
• Contributions to practical medicine . Ibid. Vol. IV issue 1
• Elementaorganonomiae ex notione motus derivata . Wittenberg 1804
• New remarks on nature - treatment of intermittent fever . Horn's New Archive 1807
• De hidropis natura et euratione . Wittenberg 1804-10
• Extract from the descriptions of Sergeev's mineral springs, written for the Siberian Medical Academy . Kazan 1811 - in Russian.
• De fructibus ex literarum studio in rempublicam redundantibus . Kazan 1819 (?)
• Some news about the Raskolnics . Stählin's archive for old and new church history. 1813 vol. 1. Explanation: The "Raskolniks" are the Russian old believers who separated from the ruling church in the 17th century. raskol = separation, waste.
• Brief description of agriculture in the Kazan Governorate . New Economic Report for Livonia, Vol. VII
• The ruins of Bulgaria . New general geogr. Ephemeris, Vol. VII
• Contributions to the "Litterary Annals of the Entire Medicine" edited by Justus Friedrich Carl Hecker . Berlin 1825
• The Russian national character . Polit. Journal 1928
• See also: Biogr. Lexicon of Prof. and teachers at the Kaiserl. University of Kazan 1804-1904 . Published in Kazan 1904. Vol. II pp. 378–81
• See also: Lexicon of the professors and teachers of the Imperial University Dorpat 1802-1902 edited by GWLewitzki, Dorpat 1903 pp. 115-119; 186; 298

literature

• Isidorus Bennsohn: The doctors of Livonia from the oldest times to the present . E. Bruhns, Riga 1905.
• Walter Friedensburg : History of the University of Wittenberg . Niemeyer, Halle a. P. 1917.
• Heinrich Kühne : Popular doctor in Kazan and Dorpat
• Dr. Bertram [that is: Georg Julius Schultz]: Dorpat's sizes and types forty years ago . Glasses, Dorpat 1868.
• Soot. Biographer. Lexicon, published by the Kaiserl. Soot. Historical society. St. Petersburg 1912, pages 274-76.

Web links

Commons : Johann Friedrich Erdmann  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Baltic Historical Commission (Ed.): Entry on Johann Friedrich Erdmann. In: BBLD - Baltic Biographical Lexicon digital