Wilhelm Bernhard Nebel

Wilhelm Bernhard Nebel

Wilhelm Bernhard Nebel (born July 3, 1699 in Marburg , † April 17, 1748 in Heidelberg ) was a German physicist and doctor as well as a professor and rector of the University of Heidelberg .

Live and act

Nebel was the son of the physician Daniel Nebel and Loysa Sara Catharina de Spina (1678-1742), a daughter of the Heidelberg legal scholar Johannes de Spina . After leaving school, Nebel first studied natural sciences, philosophy and medicine at the University of Heidelberg and deepened his medical training in Strasbourg with Johannes Salzmann and in Basel with Theodor Zwinger and others. He passed his master's examination in Basel and received his doctorate on March 24, 1719 under Johann I Bernoulli with the “ Dissertatio physica de mercuriolucente in vacuo ”. phil. After further studies in Lausanne and Geneva, he passed his doctoral examination two years later with the dissertation “ De plantis dorsiferis usualibus ”. med. from.

At the age of 24, Nebel was given the nickname “ Achilles III ” on March 8, 1723 . “ Admitted to the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina as a member ( matriculation no. 363 ) due to his scientific knowledge and skills . At that time he worked as a private lecturer and in 1724 was taken on at the High School in Herborn as a professor of mathematics, physics and medicine. In 1728 Nebel followed a call from his father who worked there at the University of Heidelberg, where he was given a professorship for anatomy and surgery and later for experimental physics with the right to receive his father's salary after his death. At the same time he became a doctor at the Sapienzkolleg, the Neckar School and at the Handschuhsheim orphanage . In addition, the Electors Karl Philipp and Karl Theodor appointed him their personal physician . In the years 1737/1738 and 1745/1746 Nebel was elected rector of Heidelberg University.

Nebel was one of the first iatrophysicists of his time, but his greatest achievement was further research into the fight against the leaves . After the Englishman Edward Jenner , Nebel was one of the first doctors in Germany who had dealt with the inoculation of smallpox from 1729 and published about it. In this context, Nebel was able to cure the elector Karl Theodor of the smallpox disease in 1744, who then had this event struck on several commemorative coins, on the obverse of which the elector thanks the Virgin Mary, while on the reverse the city of Mannheim congratulates him.

In addition, from 1741 until his death, Nebel assumed the responsibility of managing the Heidelberg Botanical Garden , which his father had re-established in 1708 after the destruction caused by the War of the Palatinate Succession .

Wilhelm Bernhard Nebel was married to Maria Elisabeth Wilhelmy (1705–1790), daughter of the Electoral Palatinate War Council and envoy at the imperial court, Johann Wilhelm Wilhelmy, with whom he only had the son Daniel Wilhelm Nebel . He followed the path of his father's life as a doctor, court pharmacist as well as university professor and rector in Heidelberg.

Fonts (selection)

• Diss. Inaug. ... de partu tredecimestri legitimo . 1731
• Diss. Inaug. med. de variolis. 1731
• Diss. Inaug. ... de signis intoxicationis . 1733
• Diss. Inaug. med. de lapide nephritico novo. 1733
• Diss. Botan. med. de acmella Palatina. 1739
• Diss. Inaug. med. pract. de cardialgia haemorrhoidali. 1739
• Diss. Inaug. ... de sudoribus particularibus consuetis. 1740
• Diss. Inaug. med. de corticis peruviani modo operandi. 1740
• Diss. Med. de synovia, eiusque remediis specificis. 1741

literature

• Wilhelm Doerr : Semper Apertus. Six hundred years of Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, 1386 to 1986 , Springer Verlag 2013, Volume 1, pp. 61/62 digitized
• Dieter Wessinghage : The high school in Herborn and its medical faculty, 1584-1817-1984 , Schattauer Verlag 1984, p. 63 digitized
• Georg Ludwig Menzer, Tribal history of the Nebel family . Gluing 1937
• University of Heidelberg (ed.): A Heidelberg dynasty spanning 200 years. Alumni families have taught at Ruperto Carola for several generations ; on Wilhelm Bernhard Nebel p. 49, in: HAIlife, Heidelberg Alumni International , Magazin 2016, p. 48/49. Online: Eine Heidelberg Dynasty , accessed on December 29, 106.

Web links

• Biography on the website of the Heidelberg History Association
• Short vita and portrait in the portrait collection of the Herzog August Library Wolfenbüttel

Individual evidence

1. ^ Member entry by Wilhelm Bernhard Nebel at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on November 14, 2016.