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Paul Gottlieb Werlhof

Born  1699
Died  1767

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    German physician and poet, born March 24, 1699, Helmstädt; died 1767.

    Biography of Paul Gottlieb Werlhof

    Paul Gottlieb Werlhof studied medicine at the University of Helmstädt under Brandanus Meibom (1678-1740), son of Heinrich Meibom (1638-1700), with whom he was closely related, and Lorenz Heister (1683-1758). After completing his studies he settled in Peine near Hildesheim in 1721, practicing there for four years. In between, in 1823, he obtained his doctorate his doctorate in Helmstädt.

    In 1825 Werlhof moved to Hanover where his skills as a physician as well as his learnedness soon earned him a great reputation. He thus attracted an extraordinary large number of clients, not least from the higher social circles, and became one of the best known physicians in Europe being consulted in far away Moscow and Rome. In 1740 he was appointed royal life physician – königlicher Leibarzt. He later rejected an invitation to become professor of medicine in his native town, remaining in Hanover until his death in 1767.

    Werlhof was a learned physician, a shrewd observer as well as a writer of great style. Besides his achievements in medicine, he also holds a not insignificant position among the numerous German eighteenth-century poets. His poems and hymns were all in German, while all his medical works were in Latin. Werlhof was a friend of Albrecht von Haller (1798-1777), also an accomplished poet.

    Bibliography

    • De medicina sectae methodicae veteris ejusque usu et abusu.
      Doctoral thesis, Helmstädt, 1723.
    • Observationes de febribus, praecipue intermittentibus et ex harum genere continuis etc.
      Hannover, 1732, 1745. Venice, 1757, 1764, 1784.
      German translation, Copenhagen, 1785.
    • Cautiones medicae de limitandis laudibus et vituperiis morborum et remediorum.
      Hannover, 1734.
    • Disquisitio medica et philologica de variolis et anthracibus, signis differentiis, medelis disserit etc. Hannoverae, sumt. haered. Nicolai Foersteri, 1735.
    • Gedichte. (Poems) 1749. 2nd edition, 1756.
    • Opera Medica. 3 volumes. Hannoverae, imp. frat. Helwingiorum, 1775-1776.
      This complete edition of his written works was arranged for by Johann Ernst Wichmann.
    • Julius Pagel (1851-1912):
      Paul Gottlieb Werlhof. In: August Hirsch, publisher: Biographisches Lexikon der hervorragenden Ärzte aller Zeiten und Völker. Urban & Schwarzenberg. 2nd edition. Berlin, 1929. Pp. 905.
    • Udo Benzenhöfer:
      Der hannoversche Hof- und Leibarzt Paul Gottlieb Werlhof (1699-1767).
      Mainz, 1992. 53 pages.

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