Pierre Borel (doctor)

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Portrait of Pierre Borel by Jacques Pauthe

Pierre Borel - Latinized Petrus Borellus - (* around 1620 in Castres ; † October 14, 1671 ibid) was a French medic and collector.

Live and act

Pierre Borel was probably the eldest son of Jacques Borel and Esther Martel. He was educated at the Collège de Castres of the Huguenots and studied medicine at the University of Montpellier . On May 14, 1643, Borel received his doctorate in medicine from the Medical School of Cahors University . From 1644 to 1653 he practiced as a doctor in his hometown Castres. In addition, Borel collected rarities, plants, antiques and minerals from Castres and the surrounding area. He published a catalog of his collection in 1645. Four years later, a version expanded to include the history of the region and the Roman inscriptions there appeared.

At the end of 1653 Borel went to Paris, brought together a collection of around 4,000 manuscripts and books by the Hermeticists , about which he published another catalog in 1654 and in 1655 became royal personal physician (Médecin ordinaire du Roi) of Louis XIV . A Gaulish-French dictionary followed a year later. Borel studied reports on the telescope and named in his work De vero telescopii inventore Zacharias Janssen as the first (1590) and Hans Lipperhey as the second (1608) inventor of the telescope. In it, he also described the polemoscope invented by Johannes Hevelius in 1637 . In 1656 100 observations made with the microscope were published.

In 1657 Borel returned to Castres and practiced there until his death. From 1657 to 1664 he was rector of the Collège de Castres. In August 1663 he married Esther Bonnafous.

Borel realized that cataracts are clouding of the lens of the eye . He recommended the use of concave mirrors , which he carried out for the first time, in the medical examination of the nose ( rhinoscopy ) and throat ( pharyngoscopy ). He is credited with the first description of a concussion . He was one of the first to use the microscope for medical purposes such as examining organs, blood and other body fluids.

Fonts (selection)

  • Catalog des raretés du cabinet de P. Borel . Castres 1645.
  • Les antiquitez, raretez, plantes, mineraux etautres choses considérables de la ville et comté de Castres d'Albigeois . Arnauld Colomiez, Castres 1649 ( online )
  • Dictionnaire des termes du vieux françois . Briasson, París 1650 ( online ).
  • Historiarum et observationum medicophysicarum . Paris 1656 ( online ).
  • Bibliotheca chimica: seu, Catalogus librorum philosophicorum hermeticorum . Charles Du Mesnil & Thomas Jolly, Paris 1654; ( Heidelberg 1656 ).
  • Trésor de recherches et d'antiquités gauloises et françaises . Augustin Courbé, Paris 1655 ( online ).
  • Carmina encomiastica, ac congratulatoria, in laudem Christianissimi Regis Ludouici XIV. Augustissimæ Reginæ Matris. Et Eminentissimi Cardinalis Mazarini . N. Foucault, Paris 1654.
  • De vero telescopii inventore . A. Vlacq, 1655 (on- line ).
  • Observationum microscopicarum centuria . A. Vlacq, The Hague 1656 ( online ).
  • Vitae Renati Cartesii, summi philosophi compendium . Paris 1656 ( online ).
  • Discours nouveau prouvant la pluralité des mondes . Geneva 1657 ( online ).
  • Hortus seu Armamentarium simplicium, mineralium, plantarum et animalium ad artem medicam utilium . Castris 1666 ( online ).

literature

  • Marie-Rose Carré: A Man between Two Worlds: Pierre Borel and His Discours nouveau prouvant la pluralité des mondes of 1657 . In: Isis . Vol. 65, Number 3, 1974, pp. 322-335 ( JSTOR ).
  • Pierre Chabbert: Pierre Borel (1620? –1671) . In: Revue d'histoire des sciences et de leur application . Center international de synthèse, PUF, October-December 1968, pp. 303-343 ( online ).
  • Eduard Faber: Borel, Pierre . In: Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography . Volume 2, Charles Scribner's Sons, Detroit 2008, pp. 305-306 ( online ).
  • Fabienne Gégou: Un dictionnaire d'ancien français au XVIIe siècle: le "Trésor de recherches" by Pierre Borel . In: Cahiers de l'Association internationale des études francaises . Volume 35, Number 35, 1983, pp. 23-39 ( online ).
  • Stefan Kirschner: Borel, Pierre . In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil, Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte . Walter de Gruyter, 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 200.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Borel, Pierre
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French physician, botanist and chemist and personal physician to Louis XIV
DATE OF BIRTH 17th century
PLACE OF BIRTH Castres
DATE OF DEATH October 14, 1671
Place of death Castres