Angela Gleixner-Lück (Tübingen):
Eye-idols, temples and chocolate-soufflés With Agatha Christie on a Dig in Northern Syria

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"This would be a magnificient site, which would be well worth digging" observed AGATHA CHRISTIE's husband, the british archaeologist MAX MALLOWAN during a survey of Northern Syria in November 1934.
He was right because his extraordinary archaeological sixth sense had located a cultural sensation - the mount of Tell Brak. In the foundations of the "eye-temple" thousands of small eye-idols were waiting to be discovered. Did MALLOWAN find gifts for a mother-goddess, or amuletts protecting people against the evil-eye or eye-diseases?
You are keen on MALLOWAN's ideas? Follow his food-steps, accompanied by AGATHA CHRISTIE's private photographs and the delicous smell of her chocolate souflé, which faned Tell-Brak in the evening-hours.
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Address: A. Gleixner-Lück, Froschgasse 15, D-72070 Tübingen

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Vadrevu K. Raju (Morgantown):
Charaka Club of New York

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The Charaka Club was organized in November 1898 by a number of medical men of New York City, who were interested in the literary, artistic and historical aspects of medicine, and who hoped to find some recreation if not profit in dealing with the less serious side of the art.
The name of the club was chosen in honor of Hindu Sage, whose history is given in the procee-dings. Glimpses from the proceedings of the Charaka Club will be presented.
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Address: V. K. Raju M.D., 3140 Collins Ferry Road, Morgantown, WV 26505 USA

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Hans Remky (Munich):
Benvenutus Grapheus
"...the most famous eye specialist in late medieval Europe"

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"We know nothing about BENVENUTUS that we have not learned from his work" (HIRSCHBERG). We are not even sure when he lived (probably XII century). His work, which was lost very early, is known only from subsequent copies and translations, and has frequently been amended. In 1474 it was printed as the first textbook of ophthalmology. By comparing various codices (XIII - XVI centuries) an attempt is made to contribute to BENVENUTUS's biography and pay tribute to his work that has again slipped into obscurity.
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Address: Prof. Dr. med. H. Remky, Arabellastraße 5, D- 81925 München

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Liliane Bellwald (Luxembourg):
Henri de Mondeville (about 1260 - about 1320), physician, surgeon, surgeon of the French King, army surgeon, author of the 'Cyrurgia'

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The presumed homeland of his childhood is Normandy in France.
As most of his studying collegues he was a clergyman. He starts studying medicine in Montpellier or in Paris. In those days Montpellier was famous for its University of Medicine. He went to Bologna to study surgery and to improve his knowledge of anatomy. GUY DE CHAULIAC, his famous student, will do the same. HENRI DE MONDEVILLE was student of GUIDO LANFRANCHI, THEODORIC and JEAN PITART.
HENRI DE MONDEVILLE is teaching in Montpellier when he is nominated to the career of a surgeon of the French King PHIILIPPE LE BEL.
MONDEVILLE has a passion for surgery. Medical deontology is close to his heart too. ARISTOTLE's philosophy impregnates his work.
When he is called to the French Royal Court, he has started his manuscript, the 'Cyrurgia'. It is the first extensive reference book for surgery in France. This work is the close predecessor of GUY DE CHAULIAC's famous 'Chirurgia Magna'. HENRI DE MONDEVILLE is critical and has an innovative character: He tries to revolutionize certain views of surgical practice. He is the first one to use illustrations and anatomical models for his lectures.
MONDEVILLE dies after several years of illness at about 1320.
(Deutsch, Francais)

Address: Dr. med. L. Bellwald, BP 1268, L-1012 Luxembourg

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Aloys Henning (Berlin):
On baptism of Joseph Hillmer's "Berlin" son Johann Joseph in 1752

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In 1999 the director of the Berlin Huguenot museum, ROBERT VIOLET, has found in the archive of the Berlin French church documented the baptism of a son of the travelling oculist JOSEPH HILLMER, and by the way that the oculist's native town was the Austrian Hainburg. There he was born on 9th of November in 1719. His father FERDINAND HILLMER was an honourable barbe-surgeon in Hainburg. So we can hope to find also the date, at which JOSEPH HILLMER has died after 1775. The Berlin Calvinistic christening ceremony for the Catholic oculist's child attracted attention, especially because it was baptized in HILLMER's house, which was against Calvinist tradition. The parish register testifies on August 1st of 1752 HILLMER'S wife from Leipzig. The document names the godfathers and godmothers, as most distinguished FREDERICK II's Secret treasurer GABRIEL FREDERSDORF, represented by a related count FREDERSDORF. Among the guests was a Madame OPPITZ. At the time in Austria a rich family OPPITZ had influence on highest ranking people. The facts make necessary new researches on the oculist. By a documentation of the First physician of Tsarina ELISABETH, HERMAN KAAU BOERHAAVE (1712 - 1753), HILLMER is suspicious, to have travelled as agent of the Prussian king to Russia in 1751, from where he was deported as charlatan. In 1748 FREDERICK II had appointed him an ordinary professor of ophthalmology at Berlin Collegium Medico-chirurgicum.
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Address: Dr. med. A. Henning Berlin, Spandauer Straße 104 K, D-13591 Berlin

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Jean Royer (Châtillon-Le-Duc):
The tragic fate of Jean-Melchior Wyrsch (1732 - 1798)

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During 1768, JOHANN MELCHIOR WYRSCH (born on 21st of August in 1736 at Buochs) was the founder and then director of The Academy of Painting and Drawing (Académie de peinture et de dessin) in the town of Besançon (France). In 1784 he was proclaimed citizen of honour in gratitude for the many favours he rendered the city during his 16 years. A street is named after him.
In 1784 he moved to Luzerne, where he founded a school for painters. He retired quickly, however, because of a progressive impairment of sight that he attributed to cataract. Apparently he was never operated on. He then retired to his native city of Buochs, where his fellow citizens named him "The blind painter".
He was murdered on the 9th of September 1798, by the troups of BONAPARTE, first consul, and his city was completely destroyed. His tragic end is a dramatic episode, largely unknown by today's inhabitants of Besançon.
(Deutsch, Francais)

Address: Prof. Dr. med. J. Royer,1 Clos des Chaneys, F-25870 Châtillon-Le-Duc

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Gerhard Holland (Kiel):
Keratonyxis, a late variant of cataract couching

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About 60 years after Daviel had introduced the extracapsular cataractextraction by incision at the lower limbus of the cornea, cataract couching, which for more than 2500 years had been done by piercing the sclera, saw a short renaissance. The reason for this development was the decision for a new access through the cornea. This method is mainly due to Buchhorn, who in his dissertation of 1806 suggested couching through the cornea, calling it Keratonyxis. His dissertation was based only upon experiments with animals. A few years later, when being an ophthalmologist in Magdeburg, he practised his new method also on human beings. By his new method not only the Depressio or Reclinatio lentis could be carried out, but a dismemberment (discission) of the lens could be practised as well. Thanks to K.J.M. Langenbeck, then a well known professor of surgery and anatomy in Göttingen, the new method soon became widely known and seemed to almost replace all other methods. It was introduced into all the textbooks of ophthalmology of that time. Thus for instance Jüngken described the Keratonyxis in his textbook of eye operations, edited in 1829. Worth mentioning is also PauliÕs treatise on this subject from the year 1838. However, in the second half of the 19th century, the cataractextraction by cornea-cut finally came to its triumphant advance, whereas terms such as Keratonyxis and Skleronyxis diminished or were used only for historical reasons. Nowadays they have completely disappeared from our vocabulary.
(Deutsch)

Address: Prof. Dr. med. G. Holland, Esmarchstraße 51, D- 24105 Kiel

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Peter Kober (Schwelm):
The development of ophthalmology within the range of the medical faculty of the university of Dorpat (Tartu)

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The numerous names alone given by the various nations indicate the tragic history of the town of Dorpat and its university: Dorpat in German, Jurjew in Russian, Therpat in Latvian, and today in Estonian - Tartu.
The university of the original hanseatic town of Livonia was founded in 1632 by King GUSTAV ADOLF of Sweden. The medical faculty's sphere of activities was limited to the Baltic Provinces. The devastation, in the course of the Great Nordic War, marked the end and the closure of the university in 1704. Reopened in 1802, the medical facility soon developed into an education center for young ophthalmologists, familiar with the emerging scientifically oriented, west and central European medical teaching in the Russian Empire. Additionally Dorpat became a stepping stone for future professorships at German universities.
The ophthalmology participated in this development. The first chair was established in 1867 and its first holder was GEORG VON ÖTTINGEN, born 1824. His successors were German speaking to start with, followed by Russian and Estonian ophthalmologists. And now that Estonia is a free republic again, the eye-hospital, after being fully modernized, meets again and as always functions as a center for research, teaching and treating.
Deutsch

Address: Dr. med. P. Kober, Zamenhofweg 4, D - 58332 Schwelm

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Gregor Wollensak (Dresden):
Weller's Textbook of Ophthalmology

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KARL HEINRICH WELLER (1794 - 1854) was an ophthalmologist in Dresden at the beginning of the 19th century. The first edition of his textbook of ophthalmology appeared in 1819, only two years after the handbook of ophthalmology from Beer in Vienna, who was the first professor of ophthalmology.
The third edition of WELLER's textbook "Die Krankheiten des menschlichen Auges" from 1826 was analyzed in terms of our present and then knowledge. Main topics of the book are inflammations of the cornea, iris, and conjunctiva, with special emphasis on syphilitic inflammations and Scrofulosa. Viral forms of inflammation were completely unknown. Cataract and its three treatment modalities of reclinatio, extractio and keratonyxis are described in detail. Increased intraocular pressure in glaucoma, ophthalmoscopy and strabismus operations were still unknown. WELLER's textbook provides a comprehensive and detailed insight into the ophthalmological state of the art at the time and illustrates nicely how many commonplace features of today's ophthalmological knowledge had to be discovered laboriously in the course of time.
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Address: PD Dr. G. Wollensak, University eye clinic of the Technical University Dresden, Fetscherstr. 74, D-01307 Dresden

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Hans Remky (München):
Henri Dor (1835 - 1912)

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HENRI DOR was the first holder of the Chair of Ophthalmology which was inaugurated at Berne University in 1867. His predecessors had been Professors of Ophthalmology and Pediatrics or of Ophthalmology and Otology. After only nine years he resigned in 1876 on the grounds of inadequate conditions at the clinic. However, he carried on his clinical and scientific work in Lyon until his death. Presentation of a bronze plaque dedicated to him in 1911, short biography.
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Address: Prof. Dr. med. H. Remky, Arabellastraße 5, D- 81925 München

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Frank Krogmann (Thüngersheim):
The connections between Austria and Switzerland in ophthalmology

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If someone investigates the connections between both Alps-countries Austria and Switzerland, it is recommended to subdivide Switzerland in the German and in the French speaking part. As a result, some interesting connections can be discovered:

HEINRICH SCHIEFL (1833 - 1915), Basel, was a student of A. VON GRAEFE, Berlin. Also GRAEFE was a student of FERDINAND ARLT, Prague - so you can call SCHIEFL an "ophthalmologic grandson" of ARLT.
FRIEDRICH HORNER (1831 - 1886) well known as the "Grand Master of the Suisse ophthalmologists" has an extraordinary importance concerning the connection between the German-speaking part of Switzerland and Austria because of his studies in Vienna.
Also ERNST PFLÜGER, Bern, did special studies in Vienna.
Switzerland started early to accept women studying medicine at the university. Therefore, the first in Austria practicing (ROSA KERSCHBAUMER) as well as the first in Austria born female eye specialists (ROSA WELT) were promoted in Switzerland.
In 1876 on Swiss territory, HANS LAUBER ["field of vision-Lauber"] was born with Austrian citizenship.
Neither Austria nor Switzerland were able to organize the 6th International Congress of Ophthalmology.
The mutual trainings in ophthalmology continued in the 20th century. HANS SLEZAK, the last professor of ophthalmology at the now closed Second University-Eye-Hospital in Vienna was practicing in the year 1956, as an assisting doctor, in St. Gallen.
Honourable members of the ÖOG (Austrian Ophthalmologic Society) are the following: ADOLF FRANSCHETTI, died 1968; RUDOLF WITMER, died 1992; ALFRED HUBER; PETER SPEISER.
Nowadays, some members of the Julius-Hirschberg-Gesellschaft, a well known society for history of ophthalmology, registered in Vienna, are among the most powerful persons of the Swiss ophthalmology.

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Address: F. Krogmann, Kirchgasse 6, D- 97291 Thüngersheim

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Robert Heitz (Haguenau):
August Siegrist's contribution to optical correction of Keratoconus

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The contribution of Professor SIEGRIST of Bern to the development of the optical correction of the keratoconus represents an essential stage in the history of contact lenses. Since 1897, he invented and used a "Wasserkasten", adapted from orthoscope of CZERMAK, which he gradually improved in a "Hydrodiaskop" provided with corrective lenses. In 1916 SIEGRIST used the first blown contact glasses from the Brothers MÜLLER of Wiesbaden, and he developed a method for a rational fitting. From 1920, SIEGRIST took part in the development of the first cut and ground contact glasses of ZEISS.
(Deutsch, Francais)

Address: Dr. med. R. Heitz, 22 A rue de l'Aqueduc, F-67500 Haguenau

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Dieter Schmidt (Freiburg):
History of the discovery of Myasthenia gravis (Erb-Goldflam), in special consideration of ocular signs

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THOMAS WILLIS first described myasthenic signs 328 years ago. RB (1879) and GOLDFLAM (1893) differentiated this disease from the progressive paralysis. RIEDRICH JOLLY (1895) gave the name "myasthenia gravis pseudoparalytica" and found a muscular fatigue-reaction, caused by serial stimulation. JOLLY already recommended the treatment with physostigmine. REMEN (1932) and MARY WALKER (1934) showed an improvement of myasthenic pareses with neostigmine. A tumor of the thymus was described by HOPPE in 1892. A thymectomy was first carried out by SAUERBRUCH (1912), later by BLALOCK (1936). Myasthenia as an autoimmunological disease was recognized by SIMPSON (1960, 1966) and NASTUK et al. (1960). Progress in diagnosis was made with the introduction of the electromyography (HARVEY & MASLAND, 1940), and of edrophoniumchloride (OSSERMAN & KAPLAN, 1952), the single fiber recordings of the muscle ("Jitter-phenomenon", STÅLBERG, 1972), and the identification of antibodies against Acetylcholine-receptors (TOYKA, 1975 und LINDSTROM 1976). Ophthalmological diagnosis was improved by the detection of "lid twitches" (GOWERS, 1902, COGAN, 1965) and "quiver movements" (COGAN et al. 1976), the electomyography of eye muscles (ALFRED HUBER, 1957), the appearance of a nystagmus (OPPENHEIM, 1901), "muscle paretic nystagmus" (SCHMIDT, 1975, 1977), and the observation of hypermetric eye movements after edrophonium injection or after sustained gaze-holding to one side (SCHMIDT, 1975, SCHMIDT et al. 1980).
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Address: Prof. Dr. med. D. Schmidt. Univ.-Augenklinik, Killianstraße 5, D-79106 Freiburg

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Gerhard Keerl (Düsseldorf):
History or Presence? - Fifty Years "Custodisplombe"

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In November 1949, next 10 fifty years ago, two outstanding operative procedures were introduced in Ophthalmology: RIDLEY implanted his first intracapsular intraocularlens, and CUSTODIS performed his first socalled "Plombenoperation" in a case with regmathogene detachment of the retina. RIDLEY's name is worldwide known and celebrated, whereas the name of CUSTODIS is almost forgotten in connection with his buckling procedure. The technical possibilities of his time, the existing knowledge and his ideas for performing this procedure are reported. There must be mentioned that he demanded a minimized, strictly to the hole localized operation without draining of retroretinal fluid in his first presentation already. Answering the question what of his method is effective still today will be tried.
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Address: Dr. med. G. Keerl, Droste Hülshoffstraße 2, D-40474 Düsseldorf

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Jörg Draeger, Corinna Thiel (Hamburg):
Charlottenlund-Conference: First scientific exploration of Ophthalmic Microsurgery

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Early on JÖRN BOBERG-ANS has convoked the few colleagues to meet, who were interested in the difficult subject. These meetings grew quickly into active scientific cooperation, which has led to the foundation of the International Ophthalmic Microsurgery Study Group (IOMSG) in 1966.
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Adressen: Prof. em. Dr. med. J. Draeger, Univ.-Augenklinik, Martinstraße 52, D-20251 Hamburg
Dr. med. Corinna Thiel, Christian-Förster-Straße 29, D-20253 Hamburg

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Gottfried Vesper (Leipzig):
Colours in ophthalmological practice and in the art of Kandinsky

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Ophthalmology attaches special importance to the correct reception of colours as by the examination of patients as of clients, for example, to evaluate them on conditions of traffic. Deviations may be congenital or hints of acute sickness.
The artist WASSILY KANDINSKY (1866 - 1944), one of the most important protagonists of abstract art in the 20th century, has discerned two main results by viewing colours, a physical influence and a psychic one.
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Address: Dr. med. G. Vesper, Harnackstraße 9, D-094317 Leipzig

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