Summary report of the sessions on veterinary history
Twelve speakers treated a subject in the framework of the main theme, "La lute contre les épizooties", proposed by the French Veterinary History Society. Six more papers on freely chosen subjects were presented.
The four bovine epizootic diseases on which the most information on surveillance and control is available prior to the XIXth century are: rinderpest, contagious bovine pleuropneumonia, anthrax and foot and mouth disease.
Rinderpest is known since ancient times. In 1715 Lancisi prescribed control through stamping-out and disinfection measures, and prohibiting animal movement. In 1762, Frederic the Great decreed punishing farmers for non-declaration, by hanging after flogging, whereas in France (1746), they were branded and condemned to perpetual forced labour. Importation of animals, meat and fresh hides from infected countries was restricted to possessing a health certificate (1714, The Netherlands).
Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia could be clearly distinguished from other pneumopathies in the XVIIIth century. Declaration became obligatory (under pain of imprisonment) as from 1773 in Switzerland, and many other countries implemented control through isolation and stamping-out measures. Vaccines based on lung fragments inserted under the skin were used in Africa, then in Europe (XVIIIth century) and improved by Willems in Belgium (1850).
Anthrax was well known by the Greeks and Romans. Its endemic character discouraged authorities to implement strict surveillance measures. In 1523 in England, heads of animals having died from the disease were impaled on flagpoles as a warning to other farmers. In France in 1783, a fine was imposed on non-declaration, and in 1883, notices displaying the word "anthrax" were obligatory on farms and in contaminated zones. First vaccines were developed by Toussaint (1880) and Pasteur (1881).
Foot and mouth disease was reported by Frascator as from 1546. Although proposed in 1771 by Adámi, declaration only became obligatory in 1839 (France), 1860 (England), 1872 (Switzerland) etc. Stampingout of affected animals was imposed in 1859 in England, and extended to exposed animals in 1884. Fist attempts of medical prophylaxis (inoculation of blood from recoverd animals) in 1892 (Kitt) and 1897 (Loeffler and Frosch).
Several cultural and social elements have favoured the foundation of the first of veterinary schools in Lyon in the middle of the XVIIIth century: a renewal of interest for agriculture and the search of a rational apprehension of sciences and crafts, as evidenced by the tremendous task of editing the comprehensive french Encyclopedia, initiated in 1751; but more urgently, the disaster of livestock production, plagued by many epizootic diseases. That is the reason why Minister of State Bertin assented, in August 1761, to subsidize the school of veterinary medicine that Bourgelat planned to establish at Lyon. The new school was housed in an old inn located ata short distance from the city, in the suburb of La Guillotičre. The first students were registered in February 1762; the were 38 at the end of the year. Bourgelat, already famous as a riding master, was helped by one or two young surgeons and a botanist for teaching seven courses: anatomy, botany and pharmacy, therapeutics, exterior, farriery, diseases and surgery. The average level of students was very poor; to be registered, they were only required to be able to read and write!
Bourgelat was an ambitious man, prone to exploit public relations. He had to justify the royal sponsorship by providing Bertin with sound evidence of the efficiency of his teaching. So, as soon as he got news of a contagious disease of the cattle in Meyzieu -a small village in the vicinity of Lyon- he came to survey the farms with a few students. He left seven of them in the village to cure the illness, under the guidance of Louis Bredin, a 24 year old man who had studied for four months only! The nature of the disease is still unknown, but the treatment was succesful. Instantly, Bourgelat had the data printed and published in every district of the kingdom.
Many other missions followed. The veterinary students were seemingly succesful until 1770 when a new surge of rinderpest occured. It is unlikely that inefficient medicines, at the hands of so poorly instructed students, could heal serious ailments. However, the common level of animal care was so bad that fighting magical recipes, using common sense and prescribing elementary principles of hygiene may explain the achievements of the first pupils of Bourgelat.
The historical transition of the farrier to the hippiatrist and animal doctor. Influence of the infectious diseases.
(Full text in: Historia Medicinae Veterinariae, 25 (1-3), 43-58, 2000)
The transition from farrier to animal doctor, from the XVIIth until the first part of the XIXth century, can be illustrated by the dynasty Lafosse of Paris (1670-1820).
1 -The grandfather Étienne Lafosse (1670-1754) was descended from a Paris farrier-family. He was a member of the guild of farriers, known since the XIIIth century with first statutes of 1463. At the age of 27 years he is appointed as 'maréchal' at the small stables of the king in Versailles. In 1724 he passed this function to his son. He died at his son's house at the age of 84.
2 -The son, Étienne-Guillaume Lafosse (1699-1765), who had inherited the commisssion at the age of 25, remained in office until 1759. He resigned on condition that his son Philippe-Étienne will be appointed. He made his fortune and his professional experience enabled him to write, between 1750 and 1758, a number of texts on horse diseases, infectious (i.a. glanders) and others.
3 -The grandson, Philippe-Étienne Lafosse (1738-1820) is the most famous. After his studies in human anatomy at the hospital Hôtel Dieu in Paris he devoted himself to hippology and became an hippiatrist. At the age of 19 he was sent to the army to detect farcinimous horses in the cavallary regiments. He fulfilled this task till the end of the Seven Years War in 1763. In between he succeded his father in 1759, and started a private veterinary school, but was very much hindered by Bourgelat, Bertin and the head of the police force in Paris, Antoine de Sartine. As from 1769 he worked on his Cours d'hippiatrique, published in 1772. From 1777-1788 he served as a veterinarian in the gendarmerie corps. During the period of the Revolution he experienced heights and lows; at one time he was chief of the remontes, and at the other he was imprisoned during ten months. Afterwards he was chosen as an associate member of the Institut de France. He left Paris and practised human and veterinary medicine in the village of Montataire (Dept. Oise) till the end of his days. He died in 1820 at the age of 82 without descendants.
The epizootic of 1774 in the South-West of France; intervention by Bourgelat and Vicq d'Azyr
After the outbreak of a contagious disease among cattle in the region of Bayonne spreading further and further, the minister of finance Turgot was reluctant to expend on funds for indemnifying farmers for the killing of diseased or suspected animals, as was advised by Bourgelat. Turgot asked the Académie des Sciences to send experts to the region. Half a year after the outbreak, the medical doctor Felix Vicq d'Azyr was appointed. In two months time he draw a plan that turned out to be successful. After two years the disease was eradicated. The founding principles applied by him kept their validity until today.
Role of Eastern European scientists in the study of the most dangerous human and animal diseases (XVII-XX centuries)
During the Cossackperiod (16th-18th century) officials, recognizable at their uniforms, were appointed to take care of quarantine measures after outbreaks of glanders, anthrax or pox. In case of foot and mouth disease the gums of sound animals were smeared with saliva or liquid from the aphts of infected animals to induce immunity. As founders of epidemiology in Eastern Europe the following persons were mentioned: D. Samoylovych (1744-1805), S. Andrievsky (1760-1818), M. Gamaliya (1749-1830), H. Bunge (1781-1860), Friedrich Brauell (1803-1882), S. Tsenkovsy (1822-1887) and O. Dedyulin (1866-1924). All of them were important for the study of anthrax.
Gilbert Breschet's contribution to the study of rabies and glanders
(Full text in: Historia Medicinae Veterinariae, 25 (1-3), 75-84, 2000)
Gilbert Breschet (1784-1845), demonstrator and later professor at the Medical Faculty in Paris, participated in important research on zoonoses. Together with François Magendie he showed, already in 1813, the possibility of transmitting rabies from man to dog and from dog to horse and donkey. In 1840 Breschet, together with Pierre Rayer, who had shown in 1837 that glanders could fatally affect man, were commissioned by the Ministry of War to investigate the susceptibility of man for glanders. In their paper in the Comptes rendus de l'Académie des Sciences of 1840 two important notions are established: 1. the difference of sensitivity of animals to a same disease according to their zoological position; 2. the occurrence of animals harbouring "morbid poisons", which can be transmitted to other species including man, such as rabies in dogs, anthrax in bovines or glanders in solipedes. The contagiousness of the latter is recalled, as well as its possible transmission from man to solipedes.
Curiously and unexpectedly, it was Magendie, who objected to the possible transmission of glanders to man. Breschet and Rayer's answer was categorical and lashing: "Mr. Magendie's opinions on glanders are entirely wrong".
Order the disorder: the epizootic of 1814
(Full text in: Historia Medicinae Veterinariae, 25 (1-3), 59-74, 2000)
When the allied armies invaded France in April 1814, they brought with them cattle from Hungary for their supply of meat. These contaminated animals in areas they were passing through; so they did in the departments to the North of the Loire river. Although some hesitated on the nature of the disease, authorities and veterinarians alike were fairly sure that they had to do with the feared cattle plague. The old legislation is revived, and peasants opposing the measures taken are punished. The new element in the fight against the disease was the deployment of information. Veterinarians and mayors had to send weekly reports to the sub-prefect, who did the same to the prefect and so on. Orders were given the other way round and sticked on the wall of the churches in the villages or peasants were gathered to hear the advices of the veterinarians. The veterinarians played a central role and this epizootic can be considered as the first consistent attempt where veterinarians and administration were joining forces to fight against bovine contagious disease.
Although therapeutics were still based on classical concepts of disease with their ideas of cosmic influences and 'spontaneism', the methods used were critically examined and comparative statistics were applied, opening the door to new research.
Moritz Friedrich Röll (1818-1907), director of the Militär Tierarznei Institut (1853-1879) and creator of the Austrian Law on Animal Contagious Diseases
Early is his career Röll, who practiced and teached veterinary medicine in Prague, was known for his committement to reform veterinary education. In 1849 he was offered the chair of pathology at the Veterinary School in Vienna. As a good pupil of Carl Rokitansky he introduced there a stricly scientific method of dissection. In 1852 he was appointed as the director of the school, a post that he fulfilled more than 26 years. In 1863 Röll was the Austrian representative at the First International Veterinary Congress in Hamburg. And two years later he was the organizer of the Second Congress in Vienna.
It was about that time that the eastern parts of the empire had to face steady outbreaks of cattle plague. Between 1850 and 1879 the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy lost 40-50 million gulden by this disease. Röll was asked to draw up a law to fight cattle plague. Within 11 weeks he presented a bill, that perfect that it was ratified by parliament without any major changes in 1868. And 16 years later the problem of cattle plague in Austria was solved. Röll had also his share in other legaislation as the Hygiene Act of 1870 and the law on disinfection of animal transportation units of 1879.
Besides his commitment to the public sector, Röll published several textbooks, on pathology and therapeutics (1856) and on contagious diseases (1881), that formed standard texts for many years. Röll reorganized veterinary education in Vienna and raised it to academic status. He did not live long enough to see the upgrading of his school to the Veterinary College in 1908. He died in Graz in 1907. Although his contemporaries had placed him on the same level as Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch, he now, wrongfully, is fallen into oblivion.
The discovery and eradication of Texas cattle fever, a historical review
In 1893, the Bureau of Animal Industry of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) published a bulltin entitled Investigation into the nature, causation and prevention of Texas or southern cattle fever by T. Smith and F.L. Kilborne.
This publication, considered to be a classic, relates to a series of studies undertaken between 1889 and 1893, which led to the discovery of the cause of the disease. In 1906, the USDA inaugurated a program, which continued to 1960, to eradicate the ticks responsible for the transmission of Texas cattle fever. The program was eminently successful and, with the eradication of vectors, bovine babesiosis was also eliminated; the savings to the US cattle industry were estinated to be in excess of $ 1 billion per year.
Meat inspection at the end of the 19th century, an example of applied natural sciences
Meat inspection as an applied science originated in the second half of the XIXth century with the investigations on the transmission of intestinal parasites through bacon and beef.
The elucidation of the life cycle of taenias and trichines enabled hygienic measures to be taken in the abattoirs in order to reduce the chance of infestations of meat consumers, often of a severe character.
Indepth investigation of tuberculosis led to a better understanding of the transmission of that disease to man by meat and milk. It was only in the second half of the XIXth century that, little by little, the responsability for the inspection of meat came in the hands of veterinarians, who are best equiped to recognize anthropozoonoses, whereas earlier this was the task of sworn butchers.
In the face of the tremendous progress of industralization and the demographic expansion of urban regions, coupled with increased demands for meat, certain veterinarians believed that they could deny the dangers of meat originating from diseased animals. This assessment led to regrettable errors that sometimes had severe consequences.
All these problems can be resolved by epidemiology, etiology, bacteriological examination and modern methods of refrigeration. At the end of the 19th century, everywhere in Europe, an important legislation on meat control was appeared. This legislation is nowadays one of the largest of the European Community.
History of bovine tuberculosis elimination in Czech Republic
In 1959 the whole cattle population was tested, using PPD tuberculin. The situation turned out to be catastrophic: 21.03% of cattle total, 32.26% of cows and almost all large ranches were affected. Hundreds of human cases of M.bovis were reported annually, mainly among the children. Elimination strategy was based upon cattle replacement process. For the breeding, initially calves were used from TB cows, later only from healthy ones. Testing of cattle population twice a year helped to discover all outbreaks. Elimination programmes were elaborated at all affected ranches at a national level. The measures taken, consisted of obligatory pasteurization of milk, reinforcement of veterinary services, target-oriented research, legislation, training, and subsidies. Zero prevalence was reached by the end of 1968. All of 1,363,000 heads of TB cattle were replaced by healthy animals. Production of milk increased by 56.33% and of beef by 47.11%. Specific risk for humans was eliminated. Cost/benefit ratio was 1:8. Surveillance programmes, including allergic testing and carried out in close cooperation with medical services, continued during decades after the elimation.
The epizootics, social plagues in 19th century Sicily
No abstract available.
"Des maladies des chiens et de leurs curacions".
Canine medicine in the XIVth century
The famous Livre de chasse by Gaston III of Foix-Béarn, called Phébus (1331-1391), is the first really technical treatise on hunting with hounds in the western world. Phébus was an extra-ordinary figure in his time: very educated, a gifted writer, powerful and cunning, military and financially clever; the many aspects of his personality made him a legendary as well as an historical figure.
In his book the author expounds his profound knowledge of and passion for game and hounds. The chapters devoted to the hounds are specially interesting for the veterinary historian. A few are consecrated to zootechnical matters (breeds, shelter, alimentary and physical hygiene). The most detailed is chapter sixteen on canine illnesses and their treatment. It is not only one of the few documents about the care of dogs in the Middle Ages, it is also a very precise and critical work. It lacks the superstitions and allegorical digressions that are so frequent in writings of that and even later periods. It is more than a simple compilation of prescriptions. Phébus describes symptoms, sometimes etiology, diagnosis and prognostic of the disorders. His observations are accurate: the description of rabies is vivid and would not be out of place in a modern textbook. He is adamant about the cause of rabies: a dog has to be bitten by a rabid dog. This is quite remarable if one sees that five centuries later, in the XIXth century, the contagious origin of dog rabies was still disputed.
As for therapeutics, Phébus is a cautious prescriber; he dislikes internal medicines and favors salves and cataplasms. He scoffs at superstition, even if upheld by the illustrious Bartholomeus Anglicus.
His materia medica does not include picturesque ingredients like dung, live or dead animals that are synonymous of popular medieval medicine. He uses a variety of plants, some spices, precious resins, a few mineral products. A detailed study of the remedies and their ingredients discloses a number of surprising effective principles.
Gaston Phébus is a rationalist, and an empiric in the good sense of the term. He likes to state: "This remedy is good for I have tested it". His wisdom is the fruit of experience. The best example of the efficacy of his principle is given by his statement "The worse thing about dogs is that they live so shortly: twelve years and they can hunt nine at most". As we can see a dog's life-expectation sixhundred years ago was not much longer than in our days with all our technical and scientific abilities.
At the beginning of this century the need for a veterinary school became evident. Because horses of the army caught glanders and soldiers were also affected by Malleomyces mallei. Dr. Joao Muniz Barreto de Aragao, general of the Medical Corps, made clear to the authorities that a veterinary school was important, not only for animal but also for human health. Through contacts with dr. Émile Roux, director of the Institut Pasteur in Paris, the Alfort Veterinary School was asked to guide the way. The first school was connected to the army. It was inaugurated in Rio de Janeiro on July, 17th, 1914. It was in existence until 1937. The lessons were given by French military veterinarians, and the teaching followed the curriculum of Alfort.
Almost at the same time two other veterinary schools were created; one, in 1914, in Olinda, Pernambuco, founded by Benedictine monks, that was open until 1926, and the other, in 1916, as faculty of the Agricultural and Veterinary College in Rio de Janeiro, still in existence.
In 1962 started the Veterinary School of the University of Rio Grande do Sul, and a year later a new school in Botucatu, Sao Paulo. After a new concept, developed by these two schools, many schools in smaller towns became established. In 1972 we had 14 and today 86! Most of them are private schools and, regrettably, the level is quite low. They are mainly teaching schools without research facilities.
Since the early 70s the curriculum of the first two years is combined with other training-schools; the teaching is being done by non-veterinarians. After an experience of 30 years it has to be concluded that this system has shortcomings on many points, especially because there is no connection between the preparatory and the clinical teaching. Also the excessive growth of schools has caused a great number of graduates that cannot find an appropriate job.
Félix Gordón Ordás (1885-1973), veterinarian and politician: a forbidden memory
Félix Gordón Ordás was born at the end of last century in León in a family of humble origin. He studied veterinary medicine at León's Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, where he got his degree in 1906. He very soon became a politician in the Radical Party, and as a consequence of this he had several problems with the authorities. One of his objectives was the organization of Spanish veterinarians, with the purpose to improve their scientific knowledge and social status. In 1923, he created the Asociatión Nacional Veterinaria de Espańa. For the first time in Spanish history the majority of veterinarians was organized in a strong and active association with one main objective: the promotion of veterinary medicine and veterinarians.
Three times, in 1931, 1933 and 1938, Gordón was elected as a delegate of the Radical Party in the Spanish Parliament. In 1931 he took an active part in framing the new Constitution of the Spanish Second Republic. However, his most important achievement was the creation of the Dirección General de Ganaderia e Industrias Pecuarias (General Direction of Animal Sciences and Food Industries), assembling all the main veterinary services, including veterinary education, in a new public organization with the purpose to improve the quality and the effectiveness of the veterinary services. All the veterinarians, working in the ministeries of Agriculture, Health, the Army and Education, were gathered in this new Direction.
Gordón took action at different levels, e.g. by promoting agricultural cooperatives, by organizing courses for farmers, by improving the organization of veterinarians, by facilitating rural insurances and by creating grants for young farmers.
Another of his aims at the Dirección was carrying out the renowned Plan Gordón, bringing a revolutionary change in veterinary education with the goal to raise veterinary studies to the level of university studies. The objectives of the Plan Gordón were focussed on veterinary professionalism by means of improvement of the quality of education, i.a. by critical selection of the teaching staff, and promoting veterinary research. Gordón proposed various measures, such as appointing practicing veterinarians as lecturers in veterinary schools; fighting the infiltration of other professionals in veterinary activities; increasing practical activities in the curriculum (e.g. animal handling); implementation of systems to measure the quality of teaching.
In 1933, he was appointed as Minister of Industry and Commerce. In 1939 he became ambassador in Mexico and Central America. During the Spanish Civil War he organized the reception of Spanish exiles in Mexico. In 1951 he was elected as president of the Spanish Republican Governement in exile in Paris. He remained at this post for nine years and afterwards he went back to Mexico, where he died in 1973.
Unfortunately, Franco's coup d'état and the Spanish Civil War destroyed all of Gordón's work; the Dirección General was dissolved and the Plan Gordón abolished. The figure of Gordón was obscured, neglected and forbidden until today. However, all his political ideas have been included in the new Spanish Constitution and Spanish universities are implementing today similar curricula as those proposed by Gordón sixty years earlier. This communication was intended to pay homage to the figure, the ideas and the work of the brightest veterinarian who has lived in XXth century Spain with the purpose to rehabilitate his name and work.
Veterinary training at a small institute: the Royal Veterinary College of Sassari
Before being incorparated as a faculty in the University of Sassari, Sardinia had a Royal Veterinary College that existed from 1928-1934. From several archives the following data could be extracted: a total of 106 students registered, all from Sardinia and all male. Only 24 graduated. The curriculum of the first two years was common for veterinary and medical students. For teaching in the two following clinical years three professors were available: for zootechnics, for pathology and for surgery.
Training and management practice for horses in Kautilya Arthshasra
The Kautilya Arthshasra is a book on political economy, written in Sanskrit in the Third century B.C.. It describes the essentials for the management of the ministeries. The author was a wise politician and adviser to king Chandra Gupta Maurya (363-311). The part, devoted to domestic animals, has chapters on the duties and selection of the departmental heads for the cattle, the horses, the elephants and the slaughter animals. The chief of the horse department (Ashwa Adhyksh) had to record all the details of breed, age and marks. Also had to be recorded if the horses were bought or received as a gift, and also if they were born in the royal stables or were received in exchange on a temporal basis. The means for subsistence had to be supplied by the ministery of finance, a month in advance. Directions were given for the building and the installation of the stables. Separate stables were prescribed for in-foal mares, for foals and for fillies, aged six months to three years. Dietary prescriptions for in-foal mares and for neonate foals were given. The book contains directions how to treat horses if ill, old or wounded in war.
Healthy horses were trained specifically for use in war or in sport. A differentiated corps of grooms had to take care of the horses, each of them had a special task; some were for training, others saddled them up, feeded them, looked after the skin and the hoofs or were responsible for the cleaning of the stables. Specially trained persons were concerned with the ornaments and the precious stones of the harnes. Punishment in case of not fulfilling the duties prescribed was regulated also.
Some old Iranian manuscripts of veterinary medicine
For his magnum opus on the history of Iranian veterinary medicine (2 vols. 1994, 1997; in Persian; a French translation is in preparation) the author studied more than 100 manuscripts with veterinary contents, dating from the 6th to the 17th century. In his presentation nine (a-i) of them received special attention:
a) A work on breeding and diseases of birds of prey, written by order of the Sassanid king Anoushirvan (died in 579); b) A work on the treatment of horses, written ca. 1140 on order of sultan Sanjar; c) Kamel al-Sana'atain Fil Beytareh [Two arts within veterinary medicine], written in Arabic in 1430 by Abu Bakr ibn Badr al-Din, chief of cavalry of the king of Egypt Nasser Ghalavoon, translated into Persian (and also into French, by A. Perron and published as Le Nâceri. La perfection des deux arts ou traité complet d'hippologie et d'hippiatrie arabes. 3 vols. Paris 1852-1860); d) Al-Aqwal Al-Kafiyah (Adaequate words) is a veterinary work of about 500 pages, written in 1358 by Al Malik Majahed, king of Arabia and Yemen. It contains the first description of an outbreak of African horse pest in Yemen in 1327; e) Two chapters from the book "Treasury of science", written by Fakhr al-Din (died in 1140), treat husbandry and diseases of horses and birds of prey; f) A chapter on veterinary medicine in the "Book of Best Techniques" of 1340; g) Mezmar-e-Danesh (Practical knowledge) is a magnficent handbook on horse medicine, written in 1690 by the chief of the Persian veterinary service, Nezam al-Din Ahmad; h) Vasf al-Khyial (Description of the horse) by the lawyer Feiz Kashani (died 1640) contains the Islamic legislation concerning horse breeding; i) One of the most important Persian and Arabic books is Al-Kheyl wal Beytareh (Horse medicine) by Ibn Akhi Hazam. The author lived in the middle of the 9th century and was the stablemaster of the caliph of Bagdad. His book contains 71,000 words and is the oldest known from the Islamic period. Here the first description of transmissible tumors and papilloma in the horse can be found. Ibn Akhi Hazam also studied glanders. A short last chapter of 1500 words treats cattle diseases. A unique complete copy of the ms. (ca. 1300 A.D.) is in the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek in Vienna.