Paul Partsch

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lithograph by Josef Kriehuber , 1842

Paul Maria Joseph Partsch (born June 11, 1791 in Vienna ; † October 3, 1856 ibid) was an Austrian geologist and mineralogist when he was a member of the Academy of Sciences.

Live and act

education

Paul Partsch was born in Vienna as the son of the kk Lotto Secretary-General Josef Partsch and his mother Katharina, née Martini. His mother encouraged his talents, which are said to have been above average. At the age of eight he already received a dispensation for three years and was accepted as a frequentant in the Theresian Military Academy in Wiener Neustadt in 1799 . In 1803 he came to the Löwenburgsche Konvikt in Vienna-Josefstadt as a pupil. There he received lessons that were realistic for the time, both in humanistic subjects and in living foreign languages.

In 1810 he began studying law at the University of Vienna, following the tradition of the maternal family. Nevertheless, he was interested in botany, mineralogy, chemistry, but also economics. With this knowledge he wanted to become a farmer.

He left the university in 1814 and, at the request of his guardian, was to complete his practical training at the Göttweig Abbey . Since he still did not see the administration of justice as his goal, he finally turned to the natural sciences.

On his botanical excursions in Lower Austria, he studied the flora and wrote down the exact rhythms of life and locations in diaries. However, this collection was never published.

Plant science led Partsch to his real interests, the soils and rocks. From Göttweig he examined the soils of the Bohemian Massif . So he came to geognosy , as the geology in this area was called earlier.

At the kk Hof-Naturalienkabinett

In 1815 he returned to Vienna and bought a house on Mariahilfer Strasse , where he set up his workshop. From there he wanted to make trips abroad to various universities in order to expand his knowledge. First, however, he carried out his own investigations in the surrounding area in Lower Austria. So he soon had one of the largest mineral collections in Vienna and he was also able to establish contacts with leading personalities of the Kk Hof-Naturalienkabinette and the court collections. Partsch worked together with curator Rochus Schüch on cataloging the collection of Count Rudolf Wrbna .

As Schüch as a librarian with the Duchess Leopoldine to Brazil went and quit the service, we were promised the position at Partsch kk Mineral Cabinet .

With this promise Partsch began his trip abroad, which was to last a year and a half. So he came to the Bergakademie in Freiberg in Saxony and then via Frankfurt to Paris, where he stayed for five months and also attended many lectures, such as those of the French geologist Brongniart , but also Cuvier and Lamarck . From there Partsch went on to London and the Netherlands. At the end of 1818 he came back to Vienna.

He returned to Vienna to take up his post. In the meantime, however, the personal physician of Emperor Franz I , Baron Andreas Joseph von Stifft , blocked the position at the mineral cabinet. The reasons have not yet been clearly explored. Partsch was no exception.

Partsch was only able to work on the collection as a volunteer . To make a living, he sold his mineral collection to London.

After he still had no permanent job in 1820, he took advantage of the invitation of the Hungarian Baron Jeszenak and traveled with him to Italy. He was able to do various botanical researches, but also through the violent activities of Vesuvius he was able to apply his knowledge from Paris and thus create a larger collection of rocks that only had to be mapped. After ten months he returned to Vienna. Since nothing had changed in Stifft's attitude, Partsch now even had to sell his house in Vienna in order to survive. Since von Stifft had mastered the entire teaching system, no position at the university or other institutes was possible.

Nevertheless, his pride kept him as a volunteer at the collection, on the other hand he had to earn his living for twelve years with private tuition. These included personalities such as Barons Kübeck and Lederer, Princess Palm, Baron Pillersorf and Count Eugen Czernin. Also Archduke Charles let his children to teach him.

In 1821 he was able to make a few excursions to Moravia and Hungary with his savings, accompanied by the chemist Benjamin Scholz and the pharmacist Ludwig. Partsch wrote his first little work that year too. For Eduard van der Nüll he carried out a post-cataloging of mineral specimens that were not yet available in the collection when Mohs cataloged them in 1802. But this remained unprinted.

The year 1823 finally brought a major order for Partsch. At the suggestion of Ignaz von Mitis , Partsch received the order from the Lower Austrian Stands to create a geological map of Lower Austria and the neighboring countries. For this job, however, he received a not very high lump sum of 2000 guilders. Since he was working on it alone, this work, which can partly be counted as part of his life's work, lasted for over 19 years.

In 1823, Count Wrbna finally dared to submit an application to Emperor Franz I for the position in the minerals cabinet in Stifft's absence. However, the emperor did not make a decision for the time being and later the count died, so that Stifft now had free rein for his intrigues against Partsch. Instead of Partsch , Johann Pohl, who had returned from the Brazil expedition , was preferred and he was first given the management of the Brazilian Museum in the Harrach House and soon the natural history cabinets.

So hit he was now applying for the post himself. After several attempts he and his colleague Kollar got the positions of overseer at the natural history cabinets after a resolution of the emperor in 1824. The remuneration of the posts was not the same, however. His modesty can be seen in his waiver of the higher wages compared to Kollar, as he was financially even worse off than he was.

In the same year he was commissioned to research strange detonation phenomena on the island of Meleda near Ragusa . Due to his volcanological knowledge, he was able to rule out feared volcanic eruptions and explain them with karst phenomena. The results of the research trip were published in book form in Vienna in 1826. For the first time, the emperor expressed the greatest pleasure for this work .

Further orders received for the geological exploration of Transylvania . The ore deposits in Offenbanya and south of Szaszvaros as well as the salt deposits were explored. However, he was unable to complete this work because he urgently had to return to Vienna.

Partsch and Mohs

Under Partsch, the importance of the mineral collection increased steadily also compared to the university. In order to strengthen the university in return, Friedrich Mohs, who had meanwhile become a baron, organized lectures at the university. He should hold his lectures at the Hof Mineralienkabinett and use the collections there. To do this, however, they first had to be converted according to Mohs' natural history system . That was the reason why Partsch had to come to Vienna in a rush to be present as a supervisor and to recategorize the collections. But since the Mohs' order for the minerals was only imperfect, Partsch also had the names of Haüy and Werner attached.

Partsch supported Mohs, but they were both completely opposite natures. While Mohs saw geognosy from the systematic and mathematical side, Partsch was the person who saw geognosy from the side of nature. They were also completely different in character. Mohs was the cool calculator, while Partsch worked and researched out of an inner calling. So the two broke up in 1831 and Partsch refused to support Mohs. This attitude was also supported by Partsch's superior Karl von Schreibers . Partsch writes in his notes:

“ This assistance on my part (although made easier in the next few years by precise records) lasted until 1831, when I fell out with the gruff and egoistic, if very deserving professor. He was a favorite of Stifft, but did nothing (although it would have been easy for him) to improve my lot: Herr Betzich, now chancellor at the kaiserl. Mineralienkabinet, which was indispensable for the lecture and gave himself completely to him, found out even more striking evidence of this. "

For the Assembly of German Naturalists and Doctors in Vienna, Partsch took over the reorganization of the conchylia collection, which he had been in charge of since 1824. He added the artesian wells in and around Vienna to a text published by Joseph Franz Freiherrn von Jacquin . At this meeting, Partsch was honored and elected Secretary of the Mineralogical Section. To hide his embarrassing job title overseer , his post was changed from clerk to inspector .

In the following years Partsch continued his work on the Lower Austrian map. The amount of 2,000 guilders had already been used up, but Partsch continued to work with his idealism at his own expense, although when the custodian position became vacant due to the death of Pohl, he was again passed over and Mohs was appointed, which again offended him.

The Partsch, who continued to work as an overseer , made further investigations. The next project was the Gleichenberg area . Back then, the city was to become a spa .

The death of the emperor and late recognition

The death of Emperor Franz I brought a turning point in his life. With this, Stifft had to give up his power shortly afterwards under Emperor Ferdinand and personnel policy was reorganized. After 19 years of service, Partsch was appointed the sixth custodian and in the same year he moved up to the third custodian with 1,400 guilders and an official apartment.

In 1836 he began regrouping the collections of the mineral collection. He donated his collection of fossils, most of which came from the Vienna Basin , to the cabinet for the establishment of a paleontological collection. The holdings also came into the cabinet from the now closed Brazilian Museum and had to be incorporated. Since Pohl was a botanist and not a geologist, his collection was more of an accumulation and required further cataloging. In addition to further studies, he continued the regrouping for the fourth room that had become vacant. Without blocking the collections, this reorganization in eight collections lasted five years until 1842. The total holdings at that time amounted to approx. 50,000 pieces of minerals, rocks, meteorites and fossils. As a result he was able to write a few more works.

In 1847, while he was on a voyage to Constantinople , Emperor Ferdinand was the only one of the natural history cabinets to be appointed a member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences . On the one hand, he fell ill in 1848, on the other hand, he was most concerned about his collections that nothing would happen to them during the uprisings. Some of the collections, like Schreiber's office, where unprinted studies were burned, or the animal cabinet, where Johann Natterer's diaries were also burned, were badly damaged.

In 1849, Partsch's health recovered to some extent. However, he was hit hard by the death of his mother, who died in 1850 at the age of 82.

In 1851 Schreibers retired and the cabinets were administratively separated. As a result, Partsch, who had meanwhile turned 63, was appointed custodian and director of the kk Hof-Mineralien-Kabinett.

In 1855 he was elected a corresponding member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences . In 1856 he became a member of the Leopoldina . He was supposed to take part in the Novara expedition that had been planned around the world for some time. In 1856, however, he died. He was buried in the Schmelzer cemetery .

Fonts

  • Descriptive list of a collection of diamonds and the apparatus necessary for working them, which were offered to the Kaiser for the Imperial Mineral Cabinet in Vienna by the Imperial and Royal Jeweler M. Cohen , 1822
  • Report on the detonation phenomenon on the island of Meleda near Ragusa. In addition to geographical, statistical and historical notes about this island and a geognostic sketch of Dalmatia , 1826
  • The artesian wells in and around Vienna, along with geognostic notes about them.
  • Geognostic and mineralogical appendix to Pohl's Brazil travel reports, 1838
  • Brief overview of the eight collections on display in the kk Hof-Mineralienkabinet in Vienna. With a floor plan , 1843
  • The mineral collection in the kk Hof Mineralienkabinet in Vienna , 1843
  • The meteorites or stones and iron masses that have fallen from the sky in the kk Hof-Mineralienkabinet in Vienna , 1843 digitized
  • About the meteor fall not far from Mezö-Madaras in Transylvania on September 4, 1852

literature

Web links

Commons : Paul Maria Partsch (geologist)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Julius Leopold Pagel :  Stifft, Andreas Joseph Freiherr von . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 36, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1893, p. 216 f.
  2. ↑ Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Vol. 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Episode 3, vol. 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 185.
  3. ^ List of members Leopoldina, Paul Maria Partsch
personal data
SURNAME Partsch, Paul
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Partsch, Paul Maria
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian geologist
DATE OF BIRTH June 11, 1791
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH October 3, 1856
Place of death Vienna