Jacob Fidelis Ackermann

Jacob Fidelis Ackermann (23 April 1765, Rüdesheim - 28 October 1815) was a German professor of anatomy and surgery.

Ackermann earned his doctorate in Mainz in 1787 and was after an extensive research travel promoted in 1789 to become private lecturer for forensic medicine. He acquired the regular professorship in botanics and later in anatomy when Samuel Thomas Soemmering resigned from his office.

In 1798 the university was dissolved. Ackermann became president and first professor of a newly founded special school of medicine. In 1804 he accepted a call as professor of anatomy and chirurgy in Jena, succeeding Justus Christian Loder . In the following year, he became professor of anatomy and physiology in Heidelberg.

In Heidelberg, Ackermann made himself a name as founder and furtherer of different institutes such as the Anatomical Theatre and the polyclinic.

At the end of summer semester 1815, Ackermann travelled as every year to his small manor in the surroundings of Rüdesheim, where he fell ill with nephritis and died soon thereafter.

Ackermann was described by his contemporaries as a very literate person, but also as a very corpylent one. Albeit his weight of 300 pounds, he was said to be able to hop longer distances on one leg while whistling cheerfully though.

Apart from his publications, the city of Heidelberg conserves a special rarity from the hands of Jacob Ackermann: the dissected skeleton of rogue chieftain Schinderhannes, well known by the novels of Carl Zuckmayer .

Publications

• Über die Kreuzung der Sehnerven, Blumbach's medical bibliography, 1788, III. 307. 706.
• Gustus organi novissime detecti prodromus, Mainz, 1790
• Über den Cretinismus, Gotha, 1790
• Darstellung der Lebenskräfte, 2 volumes, Frankfurt am Main, 1797, 1800
• Über die Erleichterung schwerer Geburten, Jena, 1804
• Kritik an der Gall'schen Schädel- und Organlehre, Heidelberg, 1806
• De febribus epitome, Heidelberg, 1809
• Über die Natur des Gewächses, 1812
• Commentarii de nervei systematis primordiis, Mannheim, 1813

Sources

• Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie - online version