William Davison

William Davison

William Davison , also Davisson, d'Avisson, Davidson, (* 1593 in Aberdeenshire , † 1669 in Paris ) was a Scottish doctor , chemist and biologist . The French form of the name is d'Avisson or like the English Davisson , the Polish Wilhelm Davidson .

Life

Davidson was born into a noble, widely ramified, and divided family. Davison studied at Marischal College in Aberdeen (later Aberdeen University) with a master's degree. Around 1614-1618 he left Aberdeen. He presumably continued his studies in Montpellier and obtained a doctorate.

From 1619 he was the doctor of Claude Dormy, Bishop of Boulogne, and later a Scottish and royalist emigrant in Paris around the court of Charles I. He also gave private lessons in chemistry and pharmacy in Paris. In 1644, thanks to the influence of Henrietta Maria of France, he became King Louis XIII's personal physician . and in 1647 administrator of the Jardin du Roi . In 1648 he took over the first chair of chemistry in Paris at the Jardin du Roi. There he held the first chemistry lectures in France and at the same time was in charge of the botanical garden. As a foreigner and Calvinist , he was exposed to the attacks of the jealous lecturers and eventually left France.

In 1649 he went to Warsaw as the personal physician of King John II Casimir and his family, after receiving the trust of Queen Luisa Maria Gonzaga . In 1651 he took over the post of court doctor and head of the Royal Garden in Warsaw . As court physician, he not only served King John II Casimir, but also numerous magnates such as Jerzy Sebastian Lubomirski , Bogusław Radziwiłł and Maria Kazimiera Sobieska . After the death of Queen Luisa Maria Gonzaga in 1667, he went back to France with his son, where they took up service with Duke Condé .

He was a pioneer of crystallography and divided crystals into hexagonal, cubic, pentagonal, octahedral and rhombic. He divided acids into mineral, animal and vegetable. He was a follower of Paracelsus ( iatrochemistry ).

Fonts

• Philosophia pyrotechnica seu cursus chymiatricus. several volumes, 1633 to 1642 (there is also a new edition 1657 and French editions) digitized .
• Oblatio Salis sive Gallia Lege Salis Condita. 1641.
• Elements of the philosophy of art de feu. 1644 digitized .
• Observations on the Antimoine. 1651.
• Les Elemens de la Philosophie de l'Art du Feu ou Chemistry. 1651, 1657 (translation).
• Commentariorum in sublimis philosophi et incomparabilis viri Petri Severini Dani ideam medicinæ philosophicæ prope diem proditurorum Prodromus. The Hague 1660, 1668.
• Theophrasti veridici Scoti Doctoris Medici Plicomastix seu plicæ e numero morborum apospasma. Danzig, 1668.
• Collectanea Chimica Medico-Philosophica Polonica. Antwerp 1698.

literature

• Thomas Finlayson Henderson, article in Dictionary of National Biography . Online .
• John Read: William Davidson of Aberdeen. In: Ambix. The Journal of the Society for the Study of Alchemy and Early Chemistry. Volume 9, 1961, pp. 70-101.
• John Read: William Davidson of Aberdeen: the 1st British Professor of Chemistry. Aberdeen University Studies 129 (1951).
• Winfried R. Pötsch (lead), Annelore Fischer, Wolfgang Müller: Lexicon of important chemists . Harri Deutsch 1989, p. 109.
• Olga Tokarczuk : Les Enfants verts (Zielone dzieci). Fictions d'Europe, La Contre Allée, Lille 2016, ISBN 978-2917817506 (French)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Les Enfants verts