Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 57-59. (Budapest, 1971)

KISEBB KÖZLEMÉNYEK — ELŐADÁSOK - Bokesová- Uherová, Mária: A nagyszombati egyetem orvostudományi karának keletkezése és szervezete (angol nyelven)

ORIGIN AND ORGANIZATION OF THE MEDICAL FACULTY OF THE TYRNAVIA UNIVERSITY* by MÁRIA BOKESOVÁ-UHEROVÁ T

he Medical Faculty, the foundation of which had been decided upon in 1769, was the first medical faculty on the territory of former Hungary. It had developed proper pedagogic and research activity. Both the Medical Faculty and the University were transferred to Buda in 1777 and, a few years later to Pest where it has been existing to this day without interruption. Therefore the Tyrnavia** Medical Faculty may be considered as the direct forerunner of the present-day Budapest University of Medicine, conscious not only of its continuity but faithful to its traditions. The question of the foundation of a medical faculty in Hungary remained an actual one especially after some unsuccessful attempts in the medieval Hungarian universities, especially the Posonium*** Academia Istropolitana, when archbishop Péter Pázmány founded in Tyrnavia in 1635 a university with the faculty of philosophy and theology at the biggest Jesuit college of that time. The aim of this university, which did not contain all the faculties, was, before all, to prepare and educate a sufficient number of priests for the Hungarian primate for re-catholicizing needs. When, however, in 1667, the faculty of law had been added, voices began to be heard which underlined the need of founding a faculty of medicine. Applications for founding a faculty of medicine on the home territory and which was to train doctors of native origin for the urgent needs of public health, were forthcoming rather from special medical circles than from Hungarian official and public institutions. It is worthy of note that besides the opinion of archbishop cardinal Leopold Kollonics who took part in the regulation of antiepidemic prescriptions and who manifested a great interest in the state of health of the inhabitants of Hungary and who connected the inadequacies in the Hungarian medical service with the activity of foreign doctors, not one * Extract from the introductory lecture delivered at the conference at Smolenice {Hungarian Szomolány) from 9 — 10 October 1969 on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the foundation of the Medical Faculty at the Tyrnavia University. The conference was convened by the Historical Institute of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. ** Hungarian Nagyszombat, today Trnava in Czechoslovakia. *** Hungarian Pozsony, today Bratislava in Czechoslovakia.