Olaus Rudbeck

Olof Rudbeck the Elder, also Olaus Rudbeckius (* September 13, 1630 in Västerås, † December 12, 1702 in Uppsala ) was a Swedish polymath. Its official botanical author abbreviation is " OJRudbeck ".

Life

Olaus Rudbeck was the son of the Bishop of Västerås, John Rudbeckius. He attended grammar school founded by his father in Västerås, 1648, Uppsala University, where he studied anatomy, including the writings of William Harvey.

In 1652 he discovered that the lymphatic vessels constitute a separate body system. There was a dispute with the Dane Thomas Bartholin about the priority of discovery. In 1653 he began studying in Leiden ( medical science, along with music, mechanics, painting and classical studies ) with a scholarship from Christina of Sweden and Axel Oxenstierna, the chancellor of the University of Uppsala, but without a degree. Rudbeck returned in 1654 as an adjunct of medicine back to Uppsala. As a professor of botany at Uppsala University operates, he passed to the botanical garden, which rose to prominence by Carl Linnaeus. 1660, he became a professor of natural history, 1661 to 1670 he was rector of the university. He later was appointed professor of anatomy and then was also curator of the university.

He reformed not only the study and designed the most modern dissecting Europe ( Theatrum anatomicum ), which could be visited for a fee by the citizens of Uppsala, but also invented fish traps, windmills and a lifting bridge, set up a postal service between Uppsala and Stockholm, and secured the water supply Uppsala by an aqueduct.

Rudbeck was also an excavator, he investigated claims to 16,000 grave mounds, which he dated on the thickness of the humus layer. He was the father of Olof Rudbeck the Younger Alfred Nobel is one of his descendants.

University of Uppsala

According to Rudbeck (1685 ) should the University be no elementary school or church school, the latter then its main purpose, but for all who sought a public office, be there whether spiritual or secular, civil or military, also for " master masons, carpenters, the builders of hammer mills and fountains and other ". So He put great emphasis on the teaching of practical skills and made ​​his students, among other things in surveying, marine and construction of fountains and fireworks being who was his particular passion.

His successor in the chair of medicine was his son Olof Rudbeck the Younger.

Works

Rudbeck created a large panel work with woodcuts, in which he wanted to depict all known plant; he drew this to the 11,000 plants. 1701 appeared the second part of the work as Campi Elysii liber secundus, 1702, the first part. In 1702 a conflagration all copies of the first part up to two, and most copies of the second part were destroyed. A new edition of the first part in 20 specimens did not appear until 1863.

From 1670 until his death Rudbeck worked at the factory Atland eller Manheim, Manheim Atlantica sive, causing Japheti posterorum sedes et patria ( Upsala 1675-98, 4 volumes). It appeared simultaneously in Swedish and Latin, where Swedish was the original version and the Latin version was created through a translator.

In the Atlantica Rudbeck tried to prove that Sweden was the Atlantis of Plato. Gomer, the son of Japheth had settled after the flood in Sweden, which allow the home to most of the European nations was ( gentium vagina, a term that was already prepared by Jordanes ). This Rudbeck was an early proponent of the theory ex septentrione lux. In Sweden, the writing ( runes ) and astronomy were invented. The favorable climate and good nutrition for the Swedish women were very fruitful ( Rudbeck reported that some particularly well-known women also brought him to his time 8-16 children into the world, or even 34, and the women were completely infertile rare). Sweden was chosen because of its wealth of fish, because fish were the most important food shortly after the Flood; other early peoples had mostly settled by the sea.

The fourth volume of Atlantica remained unfinished, only the first few chapters were printed and nearly all destroyed in the great fire of Uppsala in the summer of 1702.

While Rudbeck is today best known for his bizarre conclusions, the sound scientific principles on which these conclusions are based, increasingly recognized only recently. Erikson sees Atlantica as a point at the touch of Renaissance humanism and modern science. Erikson characterized the book as " a historical work of extreme patriotism." Rudbeck even though stressed vehemently that his love for truth is greater than that to his own country.

Taxonomic ceremony

Carl Linnaeus named in his honor the genus Rudbeckia plant sunflower family ( Asteraceae).

Works

• Axel Nelson ( Ed.), Olaus Rudbeck's Atlantica: Svenska original texts. 5 vols. Studier av och källskrifter utgivna Lärdomshistoriska SAMFUNDET ( Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell 1937-50 ).
• Disputatio Anatomica de circulatione sangvinis. Västerås, Eucharius Lauringer 1652.