Schlüsselwort: biographies

"Johann Heinrich Jung-Stilling (1740-1817) and cameralistic veterinary medicine in germany" This ergobiographical study examines an exceptional personality in the history of veterinary medicine: the pietistic author and cameralist Johann Heinrich Jung, also known as Stilling. It begins with an account of Jung`s life, notably his path to becoming a professor of cameralism in Kaiserslautern, Heidelberg and Marburg. The second section addresses the Pietism of the time, political absolutism in fragmented Germany, the 18th century Enlihgtenment movement, and the cameral sciences. Jung`s literary writing is placed in the context. His autobiography is discussed, as are his pietistic devotional books and his specialist works, which are of particular interest here: these are Jung`s writings on cameralism and his medical, veterinary and economic works. The primary focus is on the treatment of veterinary medicine within the framework of his occupation as a professor of cameral sciences. With regard to his life history, the early death of his mother is noteworthy and is elaborated upon. This circumstance caused Jung to have the inusual experience of growing up almost completely isolated from his peers. His father involved him – a sensitive child – completely in his strictly religious everday life. This left biographical traces and had a distinct influence on his pietistic faith. The concept of providence is a common theme througthout his life and made him a proponent of a deeply religious determinism. During his studies of medicine (1770-1772) in Strasbourg, he found his way into circles of Enlightenment thinkers – with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe being particulary worthy of mention here – which resulted in his literary breakthrough. Inspired by this freethinking movement, there was a phase in which he permitted himself less dogmatic, more progressive and non-pietistic thoughts. Encouraged by Goethe to write and publish his literary works, he did so up until old age. Jung was already well known during his lifetime. His religiously grounded determinism and his inability to deal with a criticism hampered not only his further literay development, but also his production of impartial subjectspecific and scientific work: there was a virtually irreconcilable contradiction between, on the one hand, his belief in providence and, on the other hand, rationally founded research abilities and innovativebess. As a professor of cameral sciences, Jung gathered all the knowledge available about each subject with extraordinary diligence and conscientiousness, an wrote his own textbooks based on this information. However, he succeeded only to a limited extent in producing independent and scientifically durable results that went beyond compilations. This study focuses particulary on Jung`s veterinary works, and a clear dependence on other authors was detected. The word-for-word similarities between writings by Jung and the content of textbooks by Johann Christian Polycarp Erxleben and Louis Vitet are striking. Given his fame, there is much academic discussion of Jung: Oskar Walzel described Jung as a medical amateur; Wilhelm Stieda criticised his inadequate scientific approach and his insufficient knowledge of contemporary economic literature; Heinrich Webler rebuked him for his superficiality; and Wilhelm Roscher reproached him for his eclecticism and his fondness for state absolutism. Maria Schwarz` academic “attempt at rehabilitation” failed because it was influenced by her family connections to Jung and, above all, tendencies, which clearly show her work was published during the period of National Socialism. Andre Wakefield`s work »The Disordered Police State: German Cameralism as Science and Practice« contains the most vehement critism of the cameral sciences and its practitioners. He chides the German cameralists, including Jung, for their shallow theory construction and their paltry results. He criticises cameralism for being a fraudulent system that, instead of aligning the interests of the “Kammer” and the state, actually concealed the facts of the prince`s fiscal and income policy.2147 At the same time, however, Wakefield draws attention to the enormous range of disciplines that were covered by the cameral sciences, though he also stresses in his study the low standard of German cameralism. The extensive writings of the proponents of economics according to Adam Smith and the scientific theorists of mercantilism in France had a considerably broader foundation – despite their scientific and theoretical fixation on the tasks of the state and confinement to the economic interests of the territorical princely houses – and took account of trade and technical production. This dissertation explores the critical elements in Jung`s works and discusses them without “throwing the baby out with the bath water” a criticism that can be levelled against Wakefield.