Théodore Tronchin (medic)

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Théodore Tronchin, engraving by René Gaillard (1719–1790)

Théodore Tronchin (born May 24, 1709 in Geneva , † November 30, 1781 in Paris ) was a Geneva doctor of French descent.

Live and act

His family descended from Rémi Tronchin (1539–1609). The Tronchin represent an old family from the city of Arles in the south of France . That Rémi Tronchin was a Huguenot and an officer in the service of the French King Henri IV , whose reign lasted from 1589 until his assassination in 1610. His wife was Sara Morin hosiery (1558–1623). One of her many children was Daniel Tronchin (1584–1655), a pastor. The Tronchin Du Breuil emerged from Daniel's line , who settled in the Netherlands and owned the Gazette d'Amsterdam there from 1690 to 1796 . Another brother, Théodore Tronchin (1582–1657), Député au synode de Dordrecht , was the great-grandfather of Jean-Robert Tronchin (1670–1730) and the father of Antoine Tronchin (* 1630). This was the father of Jean-Robert Tronchin (1670-1730) and thus the grandfather of the later doctor Théodore Tronchin.

The Tronchin family sought refuge in Geneva on St. Bartholomew's Night (August 23-24, 1572). Theodore Tronchin's father, Jean-Robert Tronchin (1670–1730), was one of the richest bankers in Geneva and Lyon , and he was also a member of the Council of the Two Hundred of Geneva, Membre du Conseil des Deux-Cents . His mother was Angélique Calandrini (1692-1715), originally from Italy , and who died young. A cousin of Tronchin was the Geneva lawyer, patron and author François Tronchin (1704–1798).

Born in Geneva, he first studied medicine at the University of Cambridge , attended lectures by Richard Mead (1673-1754), the personal physician of George II , but then moved to Leiden University , where he became a student of Herman Boerhaave . In 1730 he received his doctorate in medicine for a thesis in the field of gynecology , dissertation topic: Dissertatio medica inauguralis, de nymphæ. Leyden (1730; German: About the labia minora pudendi ). He subsequently practiced as a doctor in Amsterdam , but also took on public duties as President of the Royal College of Physicians of London and as inspector of hospitals. He married a granddaughter of the council pensioner Johan de Witt (1625–1672). Tronchin is considered to be the first doctor on the European continent to perform a variolation (1748 his own son in Amsterdam).

In the early 1750s he returned to Geneva, where he received the title of Honorary Professor of Medicine, and later moved to Paris , where he opened a medical practice in 1766.

He counted among his friends well-known women and men from philosophy and literature, especially those of the French Enlightenment, such as Voltaire , his compatriot Rousseau , Denis Diderot , etc. He had a real friendship with Madame d'Epinay and Friedrich Melchior Grimm . He wrote the article Inoculation for Denis Diderot's Encyclopédie (1751–1772).

Tronchin was an influential 18th century physician whose popularity spread among European royalty and the upper classes. In 1751 he was elected a foreign member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences . In 1762 Tronchin became a Fellow of the Royal Society , in 1778 an honorary member of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg and a foreign member of the Académie des Sciences and in 1779 a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences .

Works (selection)

  • De nymphæ. 1736
  • De clitoride. Leyde 1736
  • De cólica pictorum. Geneva 1757
  • Treatise on the Colic of Poitou. In: Collected important writings on the knowledge and treatment of bleycolic. Leipzig 1784, digitized version of the SLUB Dresden via EOD
  • In Diderot's Encyclopédie (1751–1772) he wrote the section "Inoculation"

literature

  • Henry Tronchin: Un médecin du XVIIIe siècle, Théodore Tronchin, 1709-1781. Plon-Nourrit, Paris 1906. Ouvrage couronné par l'Académie française, Prix Marcellin Guérin.
  • La Mode de l'inoculation in Catriona Seth: Les Rois aussi en mouraient. Les Lumières en lutte contre la petite vérole. Desjonquères, Paris 2008

Web links

Commons : Théodore Tronchin  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Vincent Barras: Théodore Tronchin. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . February 23, 2012 , accessed July 8, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Frank A. Kafker: Recherches sur Diderot et sur l'Encyclopédie. Année (1990) Volume 8 Numéro 8 pp. 117-118
  3. ↑ Sandra Coram Mekkey: Rémi Tronchin. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . July 11, 2011 , accessed July 8, 2019 .
  4. ^ Genealogy of Sara Morin and further ancestors
  5. ↑ Antoine Tronchin
  6. ↑ Genealogy of the parents
  7. ↑ Heirs of Hippocrates No. 899, Théodore Tronchin. Brief biography in English
  8. ^ Marie-Louise Portmann: The Variolation in the Mirror of the Correspondence of Albrecht von Haller (1708-1777) and Achilles Mieg (1731-1799) . In: Gesnerus: Swiss Journal of the history of medicine and sciences . tape 34 , no. 3-4 , 1977, doi : 10.5169 / seals-521255 ( e-periodica.ch ).
personal data
SURNAME Tronchin, Théodore
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss-French doctor
DATE OF BIRTH May 24, 1709
PLACE OF BIRTH Geneva
DATE OF DEATH November 30, 1781
Place of death Paris