Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 66-68. (Budapest, 1973)

TANULMÁNYOK - Bugyi Balázs: Az iparegészségügy kezdetei Magyarországon (1928-ig) (angol nyelven)

THE BEGINNINGS OF INDUSTRIAL HEALTH IN HUNGARY (till 1928) by BALÁZS BUGYI L T_Jungary in the 13th-17th centuries accounted for 25 to 33 percent of the total European gold and silver ore production, thereby securing the financial basis of her position as great power. The production technology applied in the mines at Upper Hungary (Selmecbánya, Körmöcbánya, Besztercebánya,* etc.) and of Transylvania (Zalatna, Nagybánya, Kapnikbánya,** etc.) was generally appreciated at its own time. An initial stage of health protection dates back to the time when first knowledge was obtained about the harms to which the human organism was exposed in these mines and in the attached foundry works,

1 Attention in this context should be called to the book "De re metallica" by Georgius Agricola who, side by side with reviewing conditions in the mines of Bohemia and Moravia, gives a detailed account in it of the mines in Upper Hungary, discussing matters of production technology, work conditions, the harms affecting the health of miners and foundrymen and the provisions taken to protect them against the diseases.

2 Paracelsus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim came again and again for shorter and longer periods of time to effect cures and conduct studies in Hungary and Transylvania. While there, he devoted much attention to the health conditions that prevailed in the mines, studying the diseases he found to occur among the miners and foundry workers and seaking for therapies to heal them. Thus he gained a lot of experience and gave account of it in a book Von der Bergsucht und anderen Bergkrankheiten^ which appear only after his death in 1567

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. * Today Banská Stiavnica, Kremnica and Banská Bistrica in Czechoslovakia. ** Today Zlatna, Baia Mare and Cavnic in Rumania. 1 Bugyi, £?.: Zur Geschichte der niederungarischen Erzbergwerke. (Lecture delivered on the meeting of the International Paracelsus Society in Salzburg in 1970. In print.) 2 Georgius Agricola: De re metallica libri XII. Basiliae, 156]. Decorativ facsimile edition translated by Hoover published by the Dover Press in New York. 3 Paracelsus, Th. Bombastus v, Hohenheim: Von der Bergsucht und anderen Bergkrankheiten. 1567. 4 Wilsdorf, H.: Dr. Georgius Agricola und Dr. Kálmán Rohrbacher aus Ungarn und die Begründung der Bergbaumedizin durch Venceslaus Payer von Einbogen, Magister Magnus Hund von Magdeburg und Dr. Theophrastus Paracelsus von Hohenheim. In: Jahrbuch des Staatlichen Museums für Mineralogie und Geologie Zu Dresden. 1959, 112—154 pp.