Lajos Méhelÿ

Lajos Méhelÿ (1862-1953)

Lajos Méhelÿ (born August 24, 1862 in Bodrogszegi (today Bodrogkisfalud ), † February 4, 1953 in Budapest ), or known in its German form as Ludwig von Mehely , was a Hungarian zoologist . His main interest was herpetology , but he also devoted himself to mammals and invertebrates .

Life

Méhelÿ came from an aristocratic family. His father served as administrator on the property of the Dessewffy family in Zemplén and then in Sáros County . He attended elementary school in his birthplace and then finished fourth grade in Kassa (today: Košice , Slovakia ). He began his high school in Eperjes (today: Prešov , Slovakia), but graduated in Lőcse (today: Levoča , Slovakia).

Méhelÿ studied chemistry , zoology and botany at the Technical and Economic University of Budapest , where he graduated in 1880. He then worked as an assistant professor next to János Kriesch, one of his former teachers. Between 1885 and 1896 he taught at schools in Budapest and Brassó (now Brașov , Romania ) and then worked in the herpetological department of the Hungarian National Museum .

In 1897 Méhelÿ received a prize from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences for an elaborate book on the herpetology of Hungary, which, however, was never published in its originally intended form. In 1991 the Hungarian National Museum brought out a work with reproductions of drawings designed as illustrations for Herpetologia Hungarica . His last major herpetological work was published in 1912. In 1913 he became head of the zoological collection of the Hungarian National Museum. In 1915 he became professor of zoology and anatomy at the Péter Pázmány University in Budapest. His interests shifted gradually from the Herpetology to mammals and invertebrates, especially the lobster-like , pill bugs and bees , while Méhelÿs assistant Géza Gyula Imre Fejervary and István József Bolkay continued the herpetological research. Méhelÿ was a staunch supporter of Charles Darwin . After World War I, he expanded his Darwinian approach to the human sciences and began to study social Darwinism and racial biology. He devoted most of his life to this ideology, which made him one of the most controversial Hungarian zoologists of his time. In 1932 Méhelÿ retired from university service.

After 1945, in the communist era, Méhelÿ was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment by the People's Court for "crimes against the state and the people" and for "war crimes". The exact date of his death was long considered unknown. Only after the political changes in Hungary in the 1990s could it be clarified on the basis of prison records that he died of malnutrition on February 4, 1953 in Vác prison in the 8th district of Budapest.

Méhelÿ's first scientific work was on insects. Between 1892 and 1942 he published around 90 papers. Many of them dealt with the systematics and distribution of the Hungarian herpetofauna . However, there were also works that were devoted to the reptiles and frogs from Ceylon, Armenia, Paraguay, Persia, New Guinea and the collections of Count Jenő Zichy (1837–1906) from Siberia, Mongolia and China. Méhelÿs was particularly interested in the vipers and real lizards , about which he wrote his most important articles, including the adder (1893), a new poisonous snake of the Hungarian fauna (1894), Vipera Ursinii Bonap., A misunderstood venomous snake of Europe (1894), vipers (Vipera berus L. and Vipera ursinii Bonap.) in Hungary (1895), systematic-phylogenetic studies on Viperiden (1911), From the native vipers (1912) and the title Archaeo- and Neolacerten about the real lizards . (Reply to Messrs GA Boulenger, FRS and Dr. F. Werner) (1907). His views on the correct taxonomic position of the real lizards led to a public dispute with the doctrines of Frank Werner and George Albert Boulenger . His first descriptions include the Bastard lizard ( Darevskia mixta ), the Armenian lizard ( Darevskia armeniaca ), which Grusinische lizard ( Darevskia bithynica ) Darevskia brauneri , the Caucasus lizard ( Darevskia caucasica ), the Croatian rock lizard ( Iberolacerta horvathi ) that Skink - Species Eutropis madaraszi from Sri Lanka and the frog species Callulops boettgeri , Austrochaperina polysticta , Cophixalus biroi , Oreophryne biroi and Xenorhina rostrata . In 1907 he introduced the lizard genus Apathya , which he named after his colleague Stephan von Apáthy . In 1909 he described the Mehely blind mouse ( Spalax antiquus ), which occurs in Romania .

literature

• Kraig Adler, John S. Applegarth, Ronald Altig: Contributions to the History of Herpetology. (= Contributions to herpetology. 5). Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles, 1989 (2nd edition 2014), ISBN 0-916984-19-2 , p. 65
• Joseph Pungur (Ed.): Hungarian World Encyclopedia Corvin History Society, Edmonton Corvinus Library, Hamilton Canada, 2013, p. 1759