Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud was born Sigismund Schlomo Freud on the 6th of May 1856 in the Moravian town of Freiberg, then part of the Austrian Empire. He entered the University of Vienna at age seventeen to study medicine after initially planning law. His early research focused on neurophysiology and the anatomy of the brain. In 1876 he spent four weeks at a zoological station in Trieste dissecting hundreds of eels. This tedious work involved searching for male reproductive organs without finding conclusive results. He later moved to Ernst Brücke's physiology laboratory where he compared human brains with those of frogs and lampreys. These biological studies proved seminal for the discovery of the neuron in the 1890s. Freud graduated with an MD in March 1881 at the age of twenty-five.
In October 1885 Freud traveled to Paris on a three-month fellowship to study hypnosis under Jean-Martin Charcot. Charcot demonstrated his methods on stage before audiences using patients who suffered from hysteria. After setting up private practice in Vienna in 1886 Freud began using hypnosis in his clinical work. He adopted the approach of Josef Breuer which did not use suggestion like French methods. The treatment of one particular patient named Anna O. proved transformative for Freud's career. She was invited to talk about her symptoms while under hypnosis and coined the phrase talking cure. Her symptoms reduced as she retrieved memories of traumatic incidents associated with their onset. Inconsistent results eventually led him to abandon hypnosis entirely. He concluded that more effective relief could be achieved by encouraging patients to talk freely without censorship. He called this procedure free association.
During the formative period of his work Freud valued the intellectual support of Wilhelm Fliess a Berlin-based ear nose and throat specialist whom he first met in 1887. Both men saw themselves as isolated from the prevailing clinical mainstream due to ambitions to develop radical new theories of sexuality. Fliess developed highly eccentric theories of human biorhythms and a nasogenital connection considered pseudoscientific today. Freud had Fliess repeatedly operate on his own nose and sinuses to treat nasal reflex neurosis. He also referred his patient Emma Eckstein to Fliess who suffered from severe leg pains and stomach issues. Fliess's surgery resulted in profuse recurrent nasal bleeding because he left half a meter of gauze inside her cavity. This removal left her permanently disfigured yet Freud maintained silence on the matter in subsequent letters. He ultimately concluded Fliess was completely without blame attributing the hemorrhages to hysterical wish-bleedings linked to an old wish to be loved in illness. Their friendship ended acrimoniously when Fliess accused Freud of plagiarism regarding sexual periodicity.
In the early 1890s Freud used treatment based on Breuer's method modified by his pressure technique. Most patients reported early childhood sexual abuse which formed the basis for his seduction theory. He published three papers in the first half of 1896 stating he uncovered deeply repressed memories of sexual abuse in all current patients. Patients were subjected to considerable pressure to reproduce infantile sexual scenes that Freud believed were repressed into the unconscious. Even after supposed reproduction of these scenes patients assured him emphatically of their disbelief. In later years Freud wrote that these reports represented Oedipal fantasies stemming from innate drives that are sexual and destructive. Some years later he explicitly rejected claims that patient reports were actual memories instead of fantasies. He abandoned the direction of investigating real trauma for the most part to focus on autonomous infantile sexuality.
From the autumn of 1902 several Viennese physicians met at Freud's apartment every Wednesday afternoon to discuss psychology. This group was called the Wednesday Psychological Society and marked the beginnings of the worldwide psychoanalytic movement. Wilhelm Stekel suggested founding this discussion group after reading The Interpretation of Dreams. The other original members included Alfred Adler Max Kahane and Rudolf Reitler who were all Jewish by birth. By 1906 the group had grown to sixteen members including Otto Rank employed as paid secretary. In March 1907 Carl Jung traveled to Vienna to visit Freud and attend the discussion group. They established a small psychoanalytic group in Zürich thereafter. In 1908 the Wednesday group was reconstituted as the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society with Freud as president. He relinquished the position in 1910 in favor of Adler hoping to neutralize his critical standpoint.
In January 1933 the Nazi Party took control of Germany and burned Freud's books among others. Freud remarked that progress was being made because they would have burned him in the Middle Ages but now only burned his books. He underestimated the growing threat and remained determined to stay in Vienna following the Anschluss on the 13th of March 1938. Ernest Jones flew into Vienna on the 15th of March determined to get Freud to seek exile in Britain. The arrest and interrogation of Anna Freud by the Gestapo on the 22nd of March finally convinced Freud it was time to leave. They left Vienna on the Orient Express on the 4th of June accompanied by their housekeeper and a doctor. They arrived at London Victoria station on the 6th of June 1938. Among those who called on Freud were Salvador Dalí Stefan Zweig Leonard Woolf and H.G. Wells. His new home was established in Hampstead at 20 Maresfield Gardens where he continued to see patients until terminal stages.
By mid-September 1939 Freud's cancer of the jaw caused increasingly severe pain and had been declared inoperable. A few days before his death he turned to his doctor Max Schur reminding him of their contract not to leave him in lurch when the time came. He stated that nothing but torture remained and made no sense. When Schur replied he had not forgotten Freud said I thank you and then Talk it over with Anna if she thinks it is right make an end of it. On 21 and the 22nd of September Schur administered doses of morphine resulting in Freud's death around 3 a.m. on the 23rd of September 1939. Three days later his body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium with Harrods acting as funeral directors. His ashes were placed in a corner of the Ernest George Columbarium on a plinth designed by his son Ernst in a sealed ancient Greek bell krater painted with Dionysian scenes.
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Common questions
When and where was Sigmund Freud born?
Sigmund Freud was born Sigismund Schlomo Freud on the 6th of May 1856 in the Moravian town of Freiberg, then part of the Austrian Empire.
What medical procedures did Sigmund Freud perform early in his career?
Freud spent four weeks at a zoological station in Trieste dissecting hundreds of eels to search for male reproductive organs. He later compared human brains with those of frogs and lampreys in Ernst Brücke's physiology laboratory before graduating with an MD in March 1881.
How did Sigmund Freud develop the technique of free association?
Freud abandoned hypnosis after inconsistent results led him to encourage patients to talk freely without censorship. This procedure replaced the earlier method used by Josef Breuer and became known as free association.
Why did Sigmund Freud abandon the seduction theory?
Freud explicitly rejected claims that patient reports were actual memories instead of fantasies. He concluded these reports represented Oedipal fantasies stemming from innate drives and shifted focus to autonomous infantile sexuality.
When and how did Sigmund Freud die?
Sigmund Freud died around 3 a.m. on the 23rd of September 1939 following doses of morphine administered by Max Schur. His body was cremated three days later at Golders Green Crematorium with Harrods acting as funeral directors.