Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 45. (Budapest, 1968)

TANULMÁNYOK - József Antall: Sándor Lumniczer and the Medical School of Pest (Angol nyelvű közl.)

SÁNDOR LUMNICZER AND THE MEDICAL SCHOOL OF PEST by JÓZSEF ANTALL (Budapest) S

ándor Lurrniczer, an outstanding personality in the history of Hungarian surgery, not to say public health, was born at Kapuvár, Sopron country, on the 29th of March, 1821 and he died in Eudapest, on the 3oth of January, 1892. His whole carreer is inseparable from the successes and failures, false hopes and bargaining compromises of Hungary, at the pinnacle of national and social transformation. He was a member of a generation of great physicians including Balassa, Semmelweis, Frigyes Korányi, among other important persons. He was the contemporary of the greatest ones, a. participant and active workman of yesterday's medical science, without which our present achievements would still be a promise of the future [1 — 2], BIRTH OF A DYNASTY Family past, surroundings, the unintentional influence ot the fathers and the grandfathers easily make their profession attractive to their offsprings'. Without eulogizing the Indian caste-system we may cite families whose names have become "dynasties" in Hungarian medical history: Stáhly, Lenhossék, Jendrassik, Verebély—

or Lumniczer. When inherited talent, early vocation homelearned methods make the progenies worthy to the ancestors, it is the better for the community. But not so, when diluted wit invokes forbears to impede emerging wit in the name of fictive talent, and false predestination. There is enough example of that both in medical and political history. Sándor Lumniczer's grandfather, István Lumnitzer (ha still spelt his name with tz, following old orthography) was born at Selmecbánya, in 1747. He studied medicine at Nagyszombat, where he got an M.D. in 1777. Prior to him there were only five grades completing medical studies (between 1772 and 1776 3, 4, 5, 2, and 12 persons graduated in each year respectively), and the university was subsequently transferred to Buda, then to Pest by the sovereign. His dissertation "De rerum naturalium adfinitatibus" was published at Pozsony (since 1920: Bratislava, Czechoslovakia) in 1777. On the basis of contemporary literature he underlined the interdependence of the natural sciences and their connection with medical science. Later he became chief medical officer of