Hieronymus Bock

Hieronymus Bock, called Tragus (Greek τράγος = ( goat ) Bock) (* 1498 ( location uncertain), † February 21, 1554 in Hornbach (Pfalz ) ), was a German botanist, physician, and Lutheran minister. Its official botanical author abbreviation is " H.Bock ".

Life

About the youth of Hieronymus Bock is out studying in Heidelberg, where he matriculated in 1519, little is known. Melchior Adam handed the names of the parents as Henry and Margaret, Bock himself mentioned in an issue of his herbal book, the nettle is included in the family crest.

As Jerome's birthplace are several places in the Palatinate and North Baden in question, The Heidelberg enrollment record in 1519 calls him " Iheronymus de Bock Schifferrstat dioc. Spir ", translated: " Hieronymus Bock from Schiffer city, diocese of Speyer ". In typical fashion, he humanistic Graecized his family name: τράγος = Greek ( goat ) Bock.

In 1522 he got a job as a teacher and botanist in Zweibrücken, the residence of Duke Ludwig II, the father of Duke Wolfgang.

Melchior Adam reported that Bock with Eva Victor became engaged on January 14, 1523 daughter of the citizens and Margaretha Heinrich Victor from Zweibrücken. On January 25, they married and were given in the following years, five girls and five boys, but most died early, just a girl and the son Henry lived longer. The eldest son, Oseas (* ca 1524, ca 1541), was adopted on 8 April 1532 of Speyer Cathedral Provost Johann von Erenberg as ' clerics ' for the community Frankweiler and so was the breakfast Measuring benefice.

The leading theological head in two bridges at that time was Johann Schwebel, who later became a reformer of Zweibrücken. This encounter shaped bracket further life. In March 1532 Bock was the personal physician of Louis, but could not for the prince, who was probably suffering from the effects of heavy alcohol abuse, do anything, he died in the course of the year.

Bock received in 1533 as a married layman (!) In a benefice Hornbacher Fabian pen. With high probability, this design was chosen to provide the renowned scientist with a reasonable basis for life and to be able to keep him in Zweibrücken. The pressure for reform of the Zweibrücker court was hardly opposed to the part of the Hornbacher Abbot Johann Kintheuser who himself lived in concubinage and probably married this woman during the 1530s something.

1533 traveled to the botanist Otto Brunfels from Strasbourg and attended Bock in Hornbach. He urged him to resign his knowledge of herbs writing what Bock in herbal book edition of 1551 specially mentioned.

Bock took it with his duties as canon's not very serious, and so it came to battle against the other canons, which was in 1536 settled in a favorable Bock comparison: Although he had to pay extra part of the foundation deposit, but was that of the teaching commitments at School liberated and also had the choir prayer ( Liturgy of the Hours ) and the chapter meetings only participate if it allowed his medical duties or botanical studies.

1536, or no later than 1538, the transition from the monastery and pin the Reformation was publicly executed: The Conventual left the convent or married, and Bock took over the parish of the municipality of Hornbach. On the first official Synod of the new " national church " in 1539, on the Schwebels " 12 Articles " (the first church order of the county from 1533 ) have been extended and signed by the attending pastors, Bock is characterized as pastor of Hornbach. In this function he is mentioned in the Visitation Protocol of 1544: " Iheronimuß Bock, pastor to Hornbach, its sized and otherwise questioned about all notturfft, the half sized want has geant word, compares itself want. "

Nevertheless, it is undisputed that his botanical, medical and pharmacological studies constitute the core of his work and his life's work. On extended trips that took him from the Ardennes to the Swiss Alps, he tried his hand as one of the first scientists of his time on a comprehensive recording and description of Central Europe (medicinal ) plants. The result of these studies is his major work, a herbal book, the publication of the most famous botanist of his time, Otto Brunfels urged him: The Kreütter book of 1539 (see details below works ).

On June 10, 1548 matriculated Jerome's son Henry at the University of Heidelberg as Heinricus de Bock Zweybruck dioc. Metensis.

1548 brought the Augsburg Interim in a major setback for the Reformation, the Protestant princes and cities came after the lost war Schmalkaldic in severe distress. In many places, the evangelical preachers were dismissed; not always succeeded, such as in Württemberg using teaching posts under the hand of the land to hold.

In Pfalz- Zweibrücken the interim provisions was counteracted particularly long and cunning, an official implementation of the Interim was so long delayed here that it could not be done nationally. What is certain is that the four monasteries of the country experienced a kind of last gasp; in Hornbach about Abbot had Kintheuser who was friends with Bock, resign and give way to the strict Catholics John Bonn of Home Guard. This locked Bock and the other Lutheran canons income and invited them an ultimatum on 26 January 1550, to renounce either of the Lutheran doctrine or its Kanonikates. Thus, the position had become untenable Bocks, also Duke Wolfgang could not help him.

End of July 1550 we find him in any case as a personal physician Count Philip II in Saarbrücken. Bock stayed not long at the Saarbrücken yard, as the most important companies but the system of a herb garden is also survived. From there he wrote to his old community Hornbach a long and urgent letter (see below under works ).

Already in 1552, so presumably immediately after the Treaty of Passau, of the interim regulations put an end, Bock returned to Hornbach - Abbot Johann Bonn had died in the meantime, so that Bock was able to continue his work as a preacher unhindered. He lived to see how his son Heinrich was established on January 25, 1553 by Sebastian Abbot as a schoolmaster in Hornbach.

On February 21, 1554 Jerome died and was buried in the Collegiate Church of St. Fabian.

His epitaph was lost; the grave inscription read: Anno domini M.DLIV. XXI. Februarii Jerome Tragos animae corporisque quondam medicus et canonicus huius Aedis in domino Jesus obdormivit, cuius anima in Consortio beatorum quiescat. Amen. ( On February 21, in the year of our Lord 1554 fell asleep soul and body of Hieronymus Bock, the doctor and canon was this house, in the Lord Jesus, whose soul rest in the communion of saints, amen.. )

Heinrich Fabricius, 1577-1600 Rector of the Gymnasium in Hornbach, a Vita Hieronymi tragi written.

Works

• The Kreütter book, Darinn Under Scheidt, name vnnd Würckung the Kreutter, shrubs, hedges vnnd Beumen, sampt jhren fruits, so inn German lands grow by H. Bock Hieronymum langwiriger auss VND certain erfarung described, published the first edition in Strasbourg 1539. Already in 1546 there was a second edition ( digitized ), this time equipped with numerous pictures of illustrator David Kandel.

• Various Reprints and further revised editions are published until the 17th century; posthumous editions are revised by Melchior Sebizius: How inter alia, a circulation of 1577 ( digitized ).

• The first Latin translation appear, 1552. In the Latin version of the herbal book, the modern version of the Riesling grape is first described.

• The great success of the work is based on the careful observations and descriptions Bocks and his years of experience as a doctor. His descriptions of plants are far more accurate and relevant than all the previous works of a similar kind His systematization, however, suffer from the attempt to bring their own experiences and observations with the traditional scientific works of antiquity in line - a futile exercise: Its taxonomy still referred the vegetative characteristics of the plant and not for the flowers.

More folk medicine works that appear deliberately in German are:

• The Bader- order of 1550, a kind of manual for the bather;
• The Teutsche Speißkammer or what healthy and sick people to be added to the body of food from 1540: not a cook book, but in a sense the first modern nutrition counselor.

• What the man inn the four times through the Jar / and fu: erter also all vnnd every month to keep inn special feature / Out the fu: enfften vnnd neuntzehenden capitel Sorani concerning the Ephesian drawn is the title of a short work of Bock, by Johann Dryander was first published in 1557 in his book New Artznei and Practicierbüchlin to all abdominal disability and Kranckheyten, trucked to Franck at Fort Myen at Christian Egenolffs heirs.

• His only theological work is the (only handwritten obtained ) Send letter to the church in Hornbach, in the goat, his former church members from the Saarbrücken exile urged to firmly stick to the once perceived truth of the Lutheran doctrine despite all Rekatholisierungsbemühungen the abbot. The letter is, in typical controversial style of the period, a living example of the pastoral effort Capricorn. Trained Reminiscent Martin Luther language, the Pauline epistolary style (and also with countless, incorporated into the text biblical phrases ) shall Bock especially the two Reformers basic insights of the " solus Christus " and " sola fide " against the Lutheran from theology of the 16th century denounced abuses of vortridentinischen Catholicism: works-righteousness, saints and metrology. The third cornerstone of Lutheran doctrine, the " sola scriptura " is indeed also briefly mentioned by Bock, however, not discussed in the comparable dimensions.

After Bock named taxa

Charles Plumier named in his honor the genus Tragia the plant family of the spurge family ( Euphorbiaceae ). Linnaeus later took the name.

The genus Tragus Haller from the plant family of grasses ( Poaceae ) is named after him.

Writings

• New Kreuterbuch of Under Scheidt, Würckung and names of Kreuter, so grow in Teutonic lands / by Hieronymus Bock. -. Strasbourg, 1546 Digitized edition of the University and State Library Dusseldorf