Kaszab Zoltán (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 70. (Budapest 1978)

Nagy, I. Z.: In memoriam Dr. Ilona Csepreghy, née Meznerics (1906-1977)

ANNALES HISTORICO-NATURALES MUSEI NATIONALIS HUNGARICI Tomus 70. Budapest 1978. In memóriám Dr. Ilona Csepreghy, née Meznerics (1906—1977) by I. Z. NAGY, Budapest On the 27th of January, 1977 we bid farewell to Mrs. CSEPREGHY, ILONA MEZNERICS, Head of the Geological and Paleontological Department of the Hungarian Natural History Museum, Budapest. With her we lost an important member of the second generation of Hungarian geology and paleontology. She was a leading figure both at home and abroad in the field of Miocene research. She was born on the 25th of May, 1906 and obtained her diploma in 1929 as a secondary school teacher at the Faculty of Arts, Pázmány Péter University, Budapest, while in 1930 her Ph.D. Between 1931 and 1934 with a scholarship she studied in the Collegium Hungaricum, Vienna. While there she worked in the paleontological collection of the Naturwissenschaftlichen Museum, Vienna under the guidance of Drs. X. F. SCHAFFER and F. KAUTSKY. Her particular interest and research from this time on were directed towards Miocene malacology and stratigraphy, which remained with her throughout her life. Between 1935 and 1940 she was employed in the Directorate of the National Committee for Scholarship then as a secondary school teacher. In the year of 1940 she joined the staff of the Geological and Paleontological Department of the National Museum. She continued research here as a museologist, later as a scientific officer. In 1951 she was nominated Department Head. In 1952 she was awarded the candidate degree by the National Postgraduate Degree Granting Board in geology and mineralogy; in 1957 she became a doctor of these subjects. She retired in 1971 but continued work until the end of 1973 as a senior scientific officer in the National Geological Insitute. In the beginning her scientific research dwelt upon several subjects but always keeping bounds within the main topic of paleontology and stratigraphy. At that time she elaborated the remains of Echinoderms, Brachiopods and Ditrupas. Subsequent to this her malacological activity of the Miocene came into full bloom. Her monographs came one after the other treating the fauna of Hidas, East Cserhát Mts., Szob and Letkés. Her Neogene Pectinids published in the French Geological Series will for a long time be a significant volume. After the detailed and comprehensive systematical works she began to publish her stratigraphical evaluations too. To successfully cultivate either systematics or stratigraphy it is indispensable to build out foreign relations and to visit museums and collections abroad. In 1941 she studied the collections of Italian museums. After a long lapse of time in 1956 she participated in the jubilee meeting of the Geological Society, Kosice. She visited Vienna twice in 1958 and 1959, first participating in the jubilee meeting of the Geological Society, then in the Neogene Conference. In 1961 she studied the Neogene fauna of the Bordeaux Basin, and the collections in Paris and Lyon. In 1964 she again participated in the Neogene conferences in Vienna and Bern. In 1972, in Paris she was discussing the preparation of the Hungarian volume of the Stratigraphical Lexicon. Her lectures delivered at these meetings and comments represent well the level of Hungarian science. The appreciation of foreign scientific circles was clearly