Technikatörténeti szemle 19. (1992)

TANULMÁNYOK - Bartha, Lajos: In Memoriam Miklós Konkoly Thege (1842–1916)

chemistry and mathematics at the Royal University of Pest and attended lectures on law in the next year. At that time, his interest in astronomy developed. After 1860 he continued his studies at the University of Berlin (attended lectures by H. W. Dove, J. F. encke and H. G. Magnus) and in 1862 he was inaugurated as Doctor of Laws. Then he travelled widely in Europe, visited renowned obsrevatories, workshops of optical and precision engineering. On returning home, he took examinations to become ship's engineer and captain and the got a diploma as engine-driver. He himself designed and built small steamboats. He also contributed to the mapping of the channel of the still dangerous Lower Danube. He was very much concerned with the reasons behind ship disasters and engine accidents. At that time he got acquainted with problems in the life of railway and his crews. In his later life, as a representative in the Hungarian Parliament, he often spoke in the interest of sailors and railwaymen. As a composer, he built close contacts with Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner. Following another round trip in Europe, in 1870, he finally decided to devote his life to astronomy. 1. Astronomer and instrument designer Miklos Konkoly Thege built a small astronomical observatory in his Ogyalla manor in 1870/71. As his collection of instruments grew in number, the space available for them became too little. He decided to establish a two-domed and then a three-domed observatory in the park of 22 cadastral acres. His first instruments, a 11-centimetre aperture refracting telescope and a 26.6-centimetre reflector were bought in England (from Coocke and Browning) and the optical parts for telescopes from S. Merz in Munich and the firm Steinheil. Among the instruments there were abundant spectroscpes and then spectrographs and spectral photometers in the observatory. Many telescopes and subsidiary instruments such as spectroscopes, photgraphic instruments and pendulum clocks were made in the Ogyalla workshop after his own design. There the main instrument of the observatory, a 10-inch (25-cm) aperture refractor was made and on it later a 6-inch (16-cm) Zeiss — photographic telescope was installed. He prepared instruments for solar observations, lunar photography, but first of all spectroscopic instruments were built. Several of his instruments were bought by foreign institutions (i. e. Potsdam, Vienna and Zagreb). Regular astronomical observation began in Ogyalla in 1872. To promote continuous observation, he employed (on his own expense) one or two assistants and an observator. The obsrevatory soon became known abroad as '6-gyalla Asrophysical Observatory*. The observations were published in reports in 16 German-language volumes from 1879 to 1896 under the title 'Beobachtungen angestelit am Astrophysikalischen Observatorium in 6-Gyalla in Ungarn*. (In Hungarian he published papers with the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.) One of the major field of his activity was continouos solar observations, drawing and later photography, between 1872 and 1918. The solar observations at Ogyalla are among the first regular records of sunspots. Meteors were observed regularly between 1872 and 1887 and occasionally until 1914. For this purpose Konkoly organised — with support from the Hunga-