Heinrich Johann Nepomuk von Crantz

Heinrich Johann Nepomuk von Crantz (Roodt-sur-Eisch, Luxembourg, November 25, 1722 - Oberzeiring, January 18, 1797) was a physician, briologist and botanist, Luxembourgish by birth and Austrian by adoption.

Biography

He was born in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. He gets the doctorate of medicine in Vienna in 1750. He is one of the first students of Gerard van Swieten (1700-1772). He later studied Obstetrics with André Levret (1703-1780) and with Nicolas Puzos (1686-1753) in Paris as well as in London.

Marries Anna Susanne Petrasch, then Magda Lena de Tremon. He has two sons and a daughter.

In the cultural capital of 18th century Europe, Vienna, then under the power of Empress Maria Theresa. At St. Mary's Hospital in Vienna he worked as an assistant teacher of obstetrics in 1754. From 1756 to 1774, he worked as a professor of physiology and medicine at the University of Vienna. In Vienna he resided until his death.

There he practiced botany and coincided in time with the Danish botanist Franciscus Mygind, also resident and working in this city.

In Vienna he edited his "Materiae Medicae et Chirurgiae" written in Latin, about the nutrition of different animals, the products that keep them healthy and how to recover them after different diseases. Heinrich Crantz became a pharmacologist and published a short and bizarre treatise on the plants from which 'Dragon's Blood' came, which is a red resin used in powdered form dried as a herbal remedy in traditional medicine. This drug comes from a plant of the genus Dracaena Vand ex L. belonging to the Agavaceae family and native to Europe and the Canary Islands. Heinrich Crantz was only aware of these plants through the Botanic Gardens.

He studied and described several species of orchids that carry their abbreviation in the specific name among them:

• Epipactis helleborine (L.) Crantz 1769
• Epipactis palustris (L.) Crantz 1769
• Orchis amoena Crantz 1769

Other described species:

• Sorbus aria
• Hypericum maculatum

Works

Page of the work of Crantz: Classis cruciformium...1769.

• "Einleitung in eine Warhe und gegründete Hebammenkunst". 1756
• "Commentarius de rupto in partus doloribus a foetu utero". 1756
• "Commentatio de instrumentorum in arte obstetricia historia utilitate et recta ac praepostera applicatione". 1757
• "Systemate irritabilitatis". 1761
• "Materia medica et chirurgica", three volumes, 1762
• "Institutions Rei Herbariae ", Crantz H.J.N. Vienna, 1766
• " Stirpium Austriarum fasciculus III, Umbelliferarum", Crantz H.J.N. Vienna, 1767
• "Classis Umbelliferarum Emendata cum Generali Seminum Tabula et Figuris...", Crantz H.J.N. Vienna, 1767
• "De Duabus Draconis Arboribus Botanicorum cum Figuris...", Crantz H.J.N. Vienna, 1768
• "Classis Cruciformium Emendata cum Figuris... ", Crantz H.J.N. Vienna, 1769
• "From here medicatis principatus Transsylvaniae". 1773
• "Die Gesundbrunnen der Österreichischen Monarchie". 1777

Eponyms

Gender

• (Gesneriaceae) Crantzia Scop.

Species

• (Apiaceae) Heracleum crantzii Thell.
• (Asteraceae) Tragopogon × crantzii Dichtl
• (Brassicaceae) Crantzian Crossifera E.H.L.Krause
• (Brassicaceae) Myagrum crantzii Vitman
• (Brassicaceae) Noccaea crantzii F.K.Mey.
• (Fabaceae) Dorycnium crantzii (Vis.) Brand
• (Ranunculaceae) Ranunculus crantzii Hedw.
• (Rosaceae) Potentilla crantzii (Crantz) Fritsch
• (Rosaceae) Rosa crantzii Schult.
• (Rosaceae) Sorbus crantzii Hayek