Philipp Friedrich Gmelin

Portrait of Philipp Friedrich Gmelin, oil painting from the holdings of the Tübinger Professorengalerie collection

Philipp Friedrich Gmelin (born August 19, 1721 in Tübingen ; † May 9, 1768 ibid) was a German doctor , botanist and chemist . He was a brother of the famous naturalist Johann Georg Gmelin .

Life

Gmelin moved to the university in his hometown at the age of 15 to devote himself to studying natural sciences and medicine. After completing the same, he made a long journey through the Netherlands and England.

In 1744 he returned to Tübingen and was appointed city physician there . In 1755 he was appointed professor of botany and chemistry in place of his late brother and held this position until his death. In 1757 he was elected a corresponding member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences .

Apart from a small botanical work ( Otia botanica, 1760), which he used as a guide for his lectures on botany, and a report on the Reutlinger Gesundbrunnen (1761), he has only published a number of occasional academic publications which deal with subjects from the most diverse areas of the Treating medicine, not rising above the level of the ordinary.

Philipp Friedrich Gmelin shares the fate of many so-called child prodigies, whose unusual precociousness gives rise to great expectations about the former importance of the individual, which remain unfulfilled.

The chemist, zoologist, botanist and mineralogist Johann Friedrich Gmelin is his oldest son.

Works

Specifica methodus recentior, cancrum sanandi, cuius historiam, analysimque chemicam, et medicam practicam. Erhardt, Tubingae 1757 ( digitized version )
with Albrecht von Haller : Preface to Onomatologia medica completa [...] or Complete Lexicon [...] of natural history. Frankfurt am Main and Leipzig 1758.

literature

August Hirsch : Gmelin, Philipp Friedrich . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1879, p. 273.

Web links

Commons : Family Gmelin - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Literature by and about Philipp Friedrich Gmelin in the catalog of the German National Library
Works by and about Philipp Friedrich Gmelin in the German Digital Library

Individual evidence

↑ 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. 94.

personal data
SURNAME	Gmelin, Philipp Friedrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German doctor, botanist and chemist
DATE OF BIRTH	August 19, 1721
PLACE OF BIRTH	Tübingen
DATE OF DEATH	May 9, 1768
Place of death	Tübingen

[1] 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. 94.