Varga Benedek szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 141-144. (Budapest, 1993)

Búcsúzunk Antall Józseftől

ment of medical historical collections from the beginnings at the turn of the century till the results of the 1980s. In his "772^ medical and pharmaceutical museology in Hungary" (Múzeumi Közlemények, 1971, 2, pp 28-42) reviewing the history of science museums, he stressed the importance of the book and manuscript collections in addition to material collections. Beside university collections (Vienna, Copenhagen etc.), independent museums were organized from the beginning of the 20th century (London: Wellcome Institute, Budapest: Medical Historical Museum in 1905, Kolozsvár: Pharmaceutical Historical Museum 1906). These, however, incomplete initiatives had been accomplished with the József Ernyey Pharmaceutical Museum (1948-1955), which collection later was taken over by the Semmelweis Museum. According to Antall's conception, the overall institute can act as a research centre having equipped with collections of objects, books, and archival papers. The basic collections are the library of the former Royal Society of Budapest Physicians (1842), its archive (1837) and museum (1905). In Hungary pharmaceutical museology started in Kolozsvár, where the materials of Hungarian pharmaceutical history were accumulated since 1887. By 1918 its collection counted 1000 items. According to the decreee of the Minister of Health and the Minister of Education Antall worked out the directives for the preservation of furniture and equipment of pharmacies with historical or artistic value, and in co-operation with the county pharmaceutical centres, he rescued many of the furniture of old officinas. Museology, with respect to medical and pharmaceutical museology formed significant chapters of his work, and gave topics for his papers and books. (Pictures from the Past of Medicine, Budapest 1973, published in four languages; Mementos of European medicine and pharmaceutic, Budapest. Corvina 1981 in three languages.) His vision of medical history was presented in the issues of the Communicationes

, which had been edited by him for decades. The Communicationes is published together with the Hungarian Medical Historical Society, in which he held the chair of secretary general (1972) and where he later became president (1987-1993). It was his idea to subdivide the work of the Society into different specialized sections (history of science, folk-medicine, medical linguistics etc.), each profiled to put experts of similar subjects in touch. Similarly, in co-operation with the Hungarian Pharmaceutical-Historical Society, a section of pharmaceutical history was also erected, where Antall was a member of the presidency too. In recognition of the contribution of the books and periodicals published by the Semmelweis Institute and the Society, and due to the intensive connections with Hungarian and foreign societies, which were always helped by the background institute, the Semmelweis Medical Historical Museum, Library and Archives, the International Medical Historical Society (Paris) and the International Pharmaceutical Society (Brema) held the first time of their history an International Medical Historical Conference in 1974, and an International Pharmaceutical Conference in 1981 in Budapest. Antall was the chief secretary of these congresses. Both international societies agreed that the most remarkable congresses, so far had taken place in Hungary. Through his historical studies on political processes or on political thought and education, he came across the problems of medical history. He recognized that the political and economical history of liberalism is closely related to health policy. He typified the characteristics of the Pest medical school, and his main field within medical history became the investigation of the role of Semmelweis, Balassa, Markusovszky, Lumniczer, Korányi in it. He gave lectures about his results in international congresses at Weimar, Bucharest, Budapest, Basel, Innsbruck etc., and from 1974 at the universities of Düsseldorf, Munich, Cologne, Marburg, Vienna, Padova and Istambul as well. It was not only the study of state health policy, and

—in accociation with Eötvös—

the investigtion of the centrist'a idea of public health reform, but museology, with respect to medical and