Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 46-47. (Budapest, 1968)

TANULMÁNYOK - Antall József: A család és az iskola szerepe Semmelweis személyiségének kialakulásában (Német nyelven)

Historical Museum and where Ignác Semmelweis, too, was born. József Semmelweis married Terézia Müller, the daughter of a well-known cartwright of Bavarian origin, Fülöp Müller, in 1810. Contemporary advertisements and archival researches prove that József Semmelweis had a considerable fortune and a prosperous trade. He owned more than one houses and also dealt in real estate. In 1823 he transferred his shop and his living quarters to a house of his own, opposite to Ignác Semmelweis' birthplace. József Semmelweis was a respected burgess, whose shop and everyday activities in the life of the civic community of the town provided a safe background to the family. This is shown by those pieces of furniture, paintings, family photos which were preserved by the family and are now in the possession of the Semmelweis Medical Historical Museum, and by the fact that all the male members of the family went to the Grammar School in Buda. There are no direct descriptions at our disposal of Semmelweis's childhood surroundings. But on the basis of contemporary registration-lists the names of those children who were of the same age and who, sons and daughters of German, Hungarian, Greek, etc. speaking-families, could have been his playmates and schoolmates, can be ascertained. At that time their district, which was a lively port on the Danube and a post-chaise terminus as well, was lived by families of various mother-tongue and religion. All this must have had no small part in the fact that both Semmelweis's Hungarian and German was not free from any accent, and even his humanity, which knew no discrimination, but never impaired his Hungarian national feelings

, must have developed there. II. All the details of Semmelweis's schoolyears are not known. But the localities of his secondary education

—whith the exception of one year—are known for sure, and so are his results. He attended the oldest grammar school of Buda, which between 1687-1773 belonged to the Jesuit Order, and after the temporary disbanding of the order was known as the Royal Catholic Grammar School, and later, following the transfer of the University of Nagyszombat to Buda (1777), was affiliated to the University. The teachers were both churchmen and laymen, except when the school was under the supervision of the Piarist Order (1831-1851). At that time education in Hungary was regulated by the second Rules of Education (Ratio Educationis, 1806). The language of tuition was Latin, while the Hungarian and the German languages were among the subjects. Three elementary forms were followed by the grammar school, which consisted of the •grammatical branch (Forms I-IV) and two humanistic classes (Forms V-VI). These were followed by two philosophical classes, which prepared one for unversity studies. The latter ones partly developed into the Faculty of Arts (becoming equal in rank with the Faculties of Law and Medicine), and partly as Forms VII-VIII were integrated into the eight form Hungarian grammar school ii8