NOTES

Abstract

WITHIN a short period Vienna has lost two of her leading scientific celebrities, von Littrow and von Ettingshausen. We regret to add to the list the name of Baron Karl von Rokitansky, the President of the Vienna Academy of Sciences, who died on July 23 at the age of seventy-four. He was born at Königgrätz, in Bohemia, February 19, 1804. After completing his medical studies at the Universities of Prague and Vienna, he became, in 1828, assistant in the Pathological Anatomical Institute at Vienna. In 1834 he accepted the chair of pathological anatomy in the University, fulfilling, in addition, the duties of prosector in the Vienna hospital, and of legal anatomist for the city. In these varied functions an enormous mass of observations was accumulated, which served as a basis for his “Lehrbuch der pathologischen Anatomie,” which appeared in five volumes, 1842-1846, and has survived three editions. At this period von Rokitansky commenced a remarkable series of investigations with the microscope, which Johannes Möller, a few years previously, had introduced into physiological research. From the Jesuits of these and other lines of investigation, he rapidly won for pathological anatomy an importance which had been hitherto wanting in German schools of medicine, and caused its recognition as the foundation for all research, not only in pathological physiology, but in the whole province of medicine. The old symptomatic system of classification was replaced by a careful discriminating study of the changes brought about in individual organs by the varied forms of disease. The delicate appliances of modern science enabled him to detect a large number of new diseases, which had hitherto been classed with other diseases on account of the apparent similarity in symptoms. To the classical researches of von Rokitansky, probably more than to any other source, modern diagnosis owes its perfection. The impulse given by him was ably seconded by the contemporary medical authorities of Austria, and on the basis of the principles formulated by von Rokitansky, Hebra in dermatology, Engel in general anatomy, Oppolzer in therapeutics, and Dittrich, Schuh, and Skoda in other special departments of medicine have grounded the famous so-called Vienna-Prague school. Von Rokitansky retired from his professorship three years ago, and published at the same time his last work, “Die Defekte der Scheidewände des Herzens.” His merits won for him numerous marks of distinction, and for some time past he has presided over the Imperial Academy of Sciences. He leaves behind him a son, Professor of Music at the Vienna Conservatorium.