Matthias Ernst Boretius

Matthias Ernst Boretius (18 May 1694 – 4 October 1738) was a botanist and physician who served as a professor of medicine at the University of Königsberg. He was the first to introduce smallpox variolation into Polish Prussia.

Boretius was born in Lec / Lötzen (Giżycko), Prussia where his father was a pastor. He studied theology at the university in Königsberg. His father died in a plague epidemic and he then chose to study medicine at the University of Leiden and received a doctorate in 1720 with a dissertation on hawkweeds under Hermann Boerhaave. In 1721 he travelled through England where he observed smallpox vaccination experiments on prisoners conducted by Hans Sloane and others.[1] He wrote about vaccination after returning to Königsberg where he became a professor. He promoted vaccination in Prussia.[2] He collected plants and established a herbarium which was arranged according to the ideas of Joseph Pitton de Tournefort.[3] His brother Johann Friedrich was married to the daughter[4] of the botanist Georg Andreas Helwing who had been a teacher of Boretius. Boretius is also referred to as the son-in-law of Helwing.[5][6]

References

  1. ^ "O eksperymentach medycznych na ludziach, które obserwował w Londynie w 1721 roku Matthias Ernst Boretius z Mazur". wilanow-palac.pl (in Polish). Retrieved 2026-02-25.
  2. ^ Neuburger, Max (1943). "British Medicine and the Göttingen Medical School in the Eighteenth Century". Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 14 (4): 449–466. ISSN 0007-5140.
  3. ^ Graniszewska M. (2018). "Drzewa i krzewy w zielniku pruskiego lekarza Matthiasa Ernesta Boretiusa (1694-1738)". Rocznik Polskiego Towarzystwa Dendrologicznego. 66: 59–83.
  4. ^ Gehrke, Louisa-Dorothea (2023-08-16). "Enclosing the Open Fields: Excursions and Their Findings in Early Modern Naturalist Exchange". Nuncius. 38 (3): 495–519. doi:10.1163/18253911-bja10065. ISSN 0394-7394.
  5. ^ Graniszewska, Maja; Kapler, Adam (2018-12-01). "Herbaria of the Prussian physician Boretius (1694-1738) in the Herbarium WA". Biodiversity Research and Conservation. 52 (1): 1–6. doi:10.2478/biorc-2018-0012. ISSN 1897-2810.
  6. ^ Spalik, Krzysztof (2014). "Pre-Linnaean herbaria viva of Helwing in the collections of the National Library of Poland and the University of Warsaw". Acta Societatis Botanicorum Poloniae. 83 (1): 13–16. doi:10.5586/asbp.2014.008. ISSN 2083-9480.
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