Matskási István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 84. (Budapest 1992)

Szujkó-Lacza, J.: Botanical legacy of Lajos Haynald (1816-1891) in the Hungarian Natural History Museum

Dr. Lajos Tehel (1769-1816) 197 was never a mineralogist in the present-day sense. He has not published mineralogical or other papers disregarding his letter to TIHAVSKY on the Lénártó meteorite, published by JACQUIN in 1814, and the only sign of TEHEL'S scientific activity can be found in his obituaries mentioning his studies on the Hungarian mineral coals. An indirect proof of TEHEL'S experiments on Hungarian coals is a contemporary report in the scientific journal "Tudományos Gyűjtemény" about the illumination of the museum building by coal-gas. This experiment - the first in Pest-Buda - was performed by TEHEL on 5-6 June, 1816. MILLER, the director of the museum, wrote in his official letters slightingly of TEHEL'S scientific knowledge and diligence, but MILLER'S prejudice is obvious. There was strained relation between them because of several clashes of authority (KOLLÁNYI 1905). Actually, TEHEL was a naturalist and an amateur collector. In the summer of 1810, i.e. before his museum career, he donated to the National Museum a lot of Roman coins found in Óbuda. There are also notes referring his collecting trips in the country undertaken by him later as the curator of the collection. TEHEL performed the first installation of the natural history collection (1810) and its rearrangement after the removal (1813/14). In 1815 he prepared a plan for the installation of the collection on an enlarged area, entitled "Systema iuxta quod Objecta Históriáé Naturalis Ordinanda erunt". The footnotes of this plan (his only work which survived) indicates his knowledge of contemporary scientific literature. These mosaic fragments may outline the portrait of the first curator of our museum. Having done the frequently thankless work of the pioneers, TEHEL left little personal heritage. He was one of the almost unknown naturalists who prepared the ground for the development of the museology of natural history in Hungary. References ANONYMOUS (1814): Das Ungarische National-Museum zu Pesth. - Vienna, 16 pp. KOLLÁNYI, F. (1905): A Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum Széchényi Országos Könyvtára. - Széchényi Könyvtár, Budapest, 485 pp. MILLER, F. J. (1818): Acta Litteraria Musei Nationalis Hungarici Vol. I. - Buda, 384 pp. MILLER. F. J. (1820): Acta Litteraria Musei Nationalis Hungarici. Vol. II. - Manuscript, Hungarian National Library, Quart. Lat. 18. Protocolum patriophilorum etc. - Manuscript, Hungarian National Library, Fol. Lat. 71. TEHEL, L. (1814): Auffindung einer neven Masse Meteor-Eisen auf den Karpathen. - Gilberts Annalen der Physik 40: 181-182. TEHEL, L. (1815): Systema iuxta quod Objecta Históriáé Naturalis Ordinanda erunt. Manuscript, Hungarian Natural History Museum, Collection of History of Science. Tudományos Gyűjtemény 1817, pp. 117, 123-124. Vereinigte Ofner Pester Zeitung 1814, Nos. 88, 89., pp. 1004-1005,1014. Author's address: Dr. GÁBOR PAPP Department of Mineralogy and Petrology Hungarian Natural History Museum H-1088 Budapest. Múzeum körút 14-16 Hungary