Johann Christian August Heinroth Research Articles

Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773-1843): the first Professor of 'Psychic Therapy' - Psychiatry in history.

Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773-1843): the first Professor of 'Psychic Therapy' - Psychiatry in history.

Qu’apporte le « psychisch-somatisch » de Heinroth à la métapsychologie freudienne ?

Le concept de psychosomatique est attribue a un psychiatre allemand, Heinroth. Dans les periodiques et les chapitres d’ouvrages francophones, il apparait des meconnaissances que notre article tente de lever : meconnaissance sur le milieu theorique d’ou survient le concept, meconnaissance sur les debats qui ont preside a la naissance de ce concept, et meconnaissance des debats theoriques que cette idee a provoquee dans tout le xixe siecle allemand (notamment avec l’idee de somato-psychique). En exhumant ces meconnaissances et en appui d’une traduction serieuse, nous replacons l’idee de Heinroth au centre de ces debats et suivons un fil rouge, vitaliste, qui ouvre une nouvelle perspective aux precautions rhetoriques prises par Freud, en raison de ces debats contradictoires anterieurs, dans son modele freudien des pulsions. Ainsi, le debat ouvert par Heinroth a pu rester moderne et contemporain. En outre, notre traduction proposee du chapitre d’ouvrage en langue allemande revele que l’idee de la psychosomatique, originellement, s’articule avec l’insomnie maniaque.[resume d’auteur]

Johann Christian August Heinroth on sleep deprivation as a therapeutic option for depressive disorders

Partial or total therapeutic sleep deprivation leads to an immediate and far-reaching release of depressive symptoms in about 60% of patients with depressive disturbances. It is for that reason that this therapeutic option is offered and studied in many psychiatric clinics. Several papers have acclaimed the German psychiatrist Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773–1843) – the first university professor of psychiatry – as a pioneer of this therapeutic approach. However, no reference has been made specifying where in his comprehensive oeuvre he promoted this notion, nor has any analysis of the texts or passages in question been delivered. This study demonstrates that Heinroth indeed understood the existence of numerous close bidirectional relationships between mental disorders and sleep, above all, disorders of the latter. Consequently, he explicitly recommended sleep deprivation as a therapy for “melancholia,” the contemporary name for depressive disorders. This finding is of apparent relevance to the history of psychiatry and sleep medicine. One should nonetheless bear in mind that the passages summarized below are scattered throughout Heinroth's famous Textbook of Psychiatry of 1818 and other works, and that Heinroth never elaborated on this issue systematically. Moreover, his statements promote the impression that they were the result of vague impressions and thoughts, and that Heinroth did not benefit from extensive experience. Yet what is important to note is that he regarded sleep deprivation as a feasible treatment option only for patients whose depression had recently been diagnosed.

Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773–1843): The First Professor of Psychiatry as a Psychotherapist

Heinroth is known as the first professor of psychiatry. His chair was established 200 years ago on the 21st of October 1811. His major importance for the history of psychotherapy has not yet been acknowledged. Heinroth regarded restriction as well as activation as fundamental remedies for mental illnesses. Restriction meant making a voluntary decision to live a life based on religious faith and to abstain from earthly satisfaction. Within his specific psychotherapeutical module—the ‘‘direct-psychic’’method—he utilized the patient’s mental powers—mood, mind and will, but also his spirituality. His therapeutic approach additionally contained elements of cognitive,behavioral and conversational therapy.

P-1144 - Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773–1843): the first professor of psychiatry as a psychotherapist

Heinroth is known as the first professor of psychiatry. His chair was established 200 years ago on the 21 st of October 1811. His major importance for the history of psychotherapy has not yet been acknowledged. Heinroth regarded restriction as well as activation as fundamental remedies for mental illnesses. Restriction meant making a voluntary decision to live a life based on religious faith and to abstain from earthly satisfaction. Within his specific psychotherapeutical module - the ‘direct-psychic’ method - he utilized the patient's mental powers - mood, mind and will, but also his spirituality. His therapeutic approach additionally contained elements of congnitive, behavioural and conversational therapy.

A 200th Anniversary of Academic Psychiatry

Back to table of contents Previous article Next article PerspectivesFull AccessA 200th Anniversary of Academic PsychiatryHolger Steinberg, M.D.Holger SteinbergSearch for more papers by this author, M.D.Published Online:1 Oct 2011https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.2011.11010024AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InEmail Official announcement of Heinroth's appointment as Associate Professor for Mental Therapy at the University of Leipzig on Oct. 21, 1811.October 21 is a birthday for academic psychiatry (1, 2). On that date in 1811, the administration of King Frederick August I in Saxony ruled that an associate professorship for “mental therapy” would be established at the kingdom's university in Leipzig and that Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773–1843) would be appointed, as declared in the document displayed here (Leipzig University School of Medicine archives, A IV 14, volume 2).Because of its profitable mining and textile industry, Saxony was one of the economically most advanced areas in central Europe. Moreover, since 1806, French liberalism had nurtured cultural, scientific, and political ambitions for social reforms. In 1810, young professors succeeded in demanding better career opportunities, which led to realignment of existing professorships in medicine at Leipzig University and establishment of new ones. The new chair for mental therapy hence was part of a larger project supervised by minister Gottlob Adolph Ernst von Nostitz und Jänkendorf, responsible for the Saxon penal, social, and health care institutions (3). He was the head of a social conservative philanthropic movement aimed especially at reforming mental health care. He also initiated the first two Saxon mental asylums, established at Sonnenstein and Waldheim in 1811. To secure specialist training for the future doctors at these institutions, the minister regarded it necessary to establish a chair in Leipzig dedicated particularly to the complex issues of mental illness and specialized cures and treatments for the insane. Owing to the Napoleonic Wars, which affected Leipzig in the Battle of the Nations, the chair could not be supplemented by the erection of a university psychiatric hospital. Also, establishment of a chair dedicated especially to psychiatry did not act as a model for other universities at that time. Chairs for psychiatry were not set up there before the 1840s. The distinction between academic psychiatry on the one hand, regarded as elitist, and institutions for mental health care on the other, which is manifest in Germany until the present day, emerged.In Leipzig, neurological and psychiatric issues had been taught more or less regularly since the 1750s, but not before 1806 had this constancy been guaranteed—by Heinroth (2), one of the “cadre of ambitious, able people aiming to make a…career and a name” through psychiatry, as Porter described them for the time before and around 1800 (4). Heinroth may have chosen to become a medical pastor to integrate a calling for theology into medicine. The issue of whether madness was a philosophical, pedagogical, theological, or medical problem was ended around 1800, when the first dedicated mental asylums were placed in medical custody. These doctors for the insane followed two different approaches, which fought each other fiercely, especially in Germany. There was the moral, psychosocial approach, most prominently represented by Heinroth, who connected mental illness with sin (5), versus the brain-anatomical, organic approach (6).Heinroth's associate professorship was never upgraded to full professorship. Although he repeatedly tried to achieve that, in 1819 he was made full professor only of medicine in general, not of “mental therapy” (Landesregierung Geheime Kanzlei 6111, volumes V–VII, Saxon State Archive, Dresden, Germany). Supported by the medical faculty, he also became doctor in charge at the town's largest care institution in 1813. This housed mentally ill inmates, whom he used for clinical demonstrations for the maximum benefit of his students. Heinroth became known through his Lehrbuch der Störungen des Seelenlebens oder der Seelenstörungen und ihre Behandlung (Textbooks of the Disturbances of Mental Life) (7), which became a reference work in psychiatry in the first half of the 19th century.Address correspondence to Dr. Steinberg (holger.[email protected]uni-leipzig.de).The announcement is reproduced by permission of the Archives of the Leipzig University School of Medicine. Image accepted for publication March 2011.

Forensisch-psychiatrische Begutachtung zu Beginn des 19. Jahrhunderts: Theorie und Praxis bei Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773-1843)

In recent years, Leipzig psychiatrist Johann Christian August Heinroth has attracted more and more attention, yet his forensic-psychiatric works have largely been neglected. Therefore this study takes a close look at his System der Psychisch-Gerichtlichen Medizin (1825) and his Gerichtsärztliche- und Privatgutachten (1847) to examine his theoretical and practical approach to examining offenders. Heinroth wanted to give forensic-psychiatric opinion on the responsibility of specialist physicians and to implement training for them. He also set up firm criteria for reports, both as regarded content and form. In such reports, he made a full review of the culprit's medical history, present physical and mental state and capabilities, as well as of any influences that might have had an impact on the deed. He also ruled that a specialist's report was to help the judge, but not to replace the judge's work. Heinroth's own works reveal his ideas, as well as his rejection of the exploitation of (assumed) mental disorders to gain exculpation for offenders.

Die Geburt des Wortes ‚psychosomatisch’ in der medizinischen Weltliteratur durch Johann Christian August Heinroth

Up to the present day the contributions Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773-1843) made to the development of psychosomatics have been little acknowledged. This paper points out that it was Heinroth who introduced the term 'psychosomatic' into medical literature and examines his concept for psychosomatic ideas. Quotations from his work, among them the passage in his famous 1818 Textbook of Disturbances of Mental Life, are presented and interpreted in their context. All this shows clearly that Heinroth's approach reveals distinct psychosomatic ideas, especially in his concept of body and soul, the etiology and pathogenesis of mental illnesses. For Heinroth soul has the primacy over the body and both interact in many ways. Consequently, mental and many somatic illnesses are caused by the soul, i. e. psychogenetically. Hence Heinroth is of major importance for the history of psychosomatic medicine, not only because he introduced the name, but also due to his holistic and anthropological approach.

The Sin in the Aetiological Concept of Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773–1843).

Throughout his work Johann Christian August Heinroth regarded sin to be the cause of mental illness. The present two-part paper investigates what exactly Heinroth understood by sin. Based on a thorough analysis of his own texts, this study shows that on the one hand Heinroth referred to sin in a Christian-Protestant sense. On the other, however, a moral-ethical code of conduct was also involved. Thus, Heinroth did not regard sin as a singular event, but rather as a life conducted in a wrong way for years or even decades, by which he meant a steady striving towards earthly, bodily satisfaction.

The sin in the aetiological concept of Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773-1843). Part 1: Between theology and psychiatry. Heinroth's concepts of 'whose being', 'freedom', 'reason' and 'disturbance of the soul'.

Throughout his work Johann Christian August Heinroth regarded sin to be the cause of mental illness. The present two-part paper investigates what exactly Heinroth understood by sin. Based on a thorough analysis of his own texts, this study shows that on the one hand Heinroth referred to sin in a Christian-Protestant sense. On the other, however, a moral-ethical code of conduct was also involved. Thus, Heinroth did not regard sin as a singular event, but rather as a life conducted in a wrong way for years or even decades, by which he meant a steady striving towards earthly, bodily satisfaction.

"I am rather satisfied with this interpretation of my dreams." -- real-life and work-related encounters between psychiatrist Johann Christian August Heinroth and poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Apart from being a major pioneer of modern psychiatry, Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773 - 1843) is foremost famous as the first academic teacher, professor of this subject at Leipzig University. Despite his theoretical concepts being thoroughly investigated by medical historians, the fact that his scientific work also brought him in contact with Weimar poet and scientist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749 - 1832) has up to now not been acknowledged. This paper analyses for the first time the manifold points of contact between the two geniuses. Starting off with a retrospective on Goethe's relationship towards psychiatry in his day, this paper investigates the mutual interconnections and influences between the two. This is achieved by an analysis of yet unknown primary sources as well as Goethe's literary and scientific works. A main emphasis is also placed on Heinroth's Textbook of Anthropology of 1822 in which the psychiatrist laid out his understanding of 'relational thinking' (gegenständliches Denken), a key concept for both. This theory developed from Heinroth's dealing with Goethe's concept of "anschauung" and was to gain major importance not only for his way of gaining knowledge in general but also for his psychiatric concept. Goethe's influence on Heinroth is particularly revealed in the latter's holistic views on mental illnesses. Heinroth's visit to Goethe on 15 September 1827 can be earmarked as a sign of their mutual esteem.

Creation of the first university chair in psychiatry: Johann Christian August Heinroth in Leipzig

Much research has been done on the work of the alleged "psychicist" Johann Christian August Heinroth (1773-1843). However, his academic career has not yet been investigated in depth. For the first time, original archive material and other sources are quoted to illuminate his history and that of the first European chair of psychiatry at Leipzig University in Germany. Heinroth was first appointed associate professor (without a specific subject), and on 21 October 1811 he became the first associate professor of "psychic therapy". Despite his efforts, this chair was not transformed into a fellow professorship in 1815. In 1819, Heinroth succeeded in being appointed fellow professor, but for medicine in general and not psychiatry in particular. Thus his position was upgraded but his subject was not. After Heinroth's death in 1843, Justus Radius (1797-1884) took over psychiatry as a third, "part-time" chair. After several shifts in responsibilities, he ceased being explicitly referred to as professor of psychiatry.

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