Leopold Heinrich Fischer (19 December 1817,

Fribourg-en-Brisgau Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of about 355,000 (2021), while the greater Freiburg metrop ...

– 2 February 1886, Fribourg-en-Brisgau) was a German

zoologist Zoology ( , ) is the scientific study of animals. Its studies include the structure, embryology, classification, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinct, and how they interact with their ecosystems. Zoology is one ...

and

mineralogist Mineralogy is a subject of geology specializing in the scientific study of the chemistry, crystal structure, and physical (including optical mineralogy, optical) properties of minerals and mineralized artifact (archaeology), artifacts. Specific s ...

Biography

He was the son of Aloys Fischer. He studied

medicine Medicine is the science and Praxis (process), practice of caring for patients, managing the Medical diagnosis, diagnosis, prognosis, Preventive medicine, prevention, therapy, treatment, Palliative care, palliation of their injury or disease, ...

at Freiburg and

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

, and afterwards, worked as a general practitioner in Freiburg-in-Brisgau. From 1845 he taught classes in zoology and mineralogy, and in 1854 was named an associate professor of mineralogy and

geology Geology (). is a branch of natural science concerned with the Earth and other astronomical objects, the rocks of which they are composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Earth ...

at the

University of Freiburg The University of Freiburg (colloquially ), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (), is a public university, public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The university was founded in 1 ...

, where in 1859 he attained a full professorship. From 1855 he served as director of the mineralogical-geognostic collection. He was one of the top specialists in the

classification Classification is the activity of assigning objects to some pre-existing classes or categories. This is distinct from the task of establishing the classes themselves (for example through cluster analysis). Examples include diagnostic tests, identif ...

of insects of his time. After much research in geology, he devoted himself to the study of

prehistoric people Prehistory, also called pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the first known use of stone tools by hominins million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The us ...

and studied

stone tool Stone tools have been used throughout human history but are most closely associated with prehistoric cultures and in particular those of the Stone Age. Stone tools may be made of either ground stone or knapped stone, the latter fashioned by a ...

s from an evolutionary point of view and also their geographical distribution. His collections are in the

Naturhistorisches Museum The Natural History Museum Vienna () is a large natural history museum located in Vienna, Austria. The NHM Vienna is one of the largest museums and non-university research institutions in Austria and an important center of excellence for all matt ...

in Vienna. With Alexander Ecker, he was co-director of the Museum für Urgeschichte und Ethnographie (Museum of Prehistory and Ethnography) at Freiburg. Fischer was elected a member of the

American Antiquarian Society The American Antiquarian Society (AAS), located in Worcester, Massachusetts, is both a learned society and a national research library of pre-twentieth-century American history and culture. Founded in 1812, it is the oldest historical society in ...

in 1881.American Antiquarian Society Members Directory
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Published works

His most significant works are: * ''

Orthoptera Orthoptera () is an order of insects that comprises the grasshoppers, locusts, and crickets, including closely related insects, such as the bush crickets or katydids and wētā. The order is subdivided into two suborders: Caelifera – gras ...

Europaea'' (1853). * ''Clavis der Silicate'' (1864). * ''Chronologischer Überblick über die allmalige Einführung der Mikroskopie in das Studium der Mineralogie, Petrographie und Paläontologie'' (1868). * ''Kritische mikroskopisch-mineralogische Studien'' (1869, 1871–73). * ''Nephrit und Jadeit nach ihren mineralogischen Eigenschaften, sowie nach ihrer urgerschichtlishen und ethnographischen Bedeutung'' (1875). * ''On stone implements in Asia''; from Proceedings of American Antiquarian Society, April 30, 1884. and many other scientific articles.

References

Source: "This article incorporates translated text from an equivalent article at the

French Wikipedia The French Wikipedia () is the French-language edition of Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia. This edition was started on 23 March 2001, two months after the official creation of Wikipedia. It has :fr:Special:Statistics, encyclopedia artic ...

". {{DEFAULTSORT:Fischer, Leopold HeinrichAchille 1817 births 1886 deaths German entomologists German mineralogists Academic staff of the University of Freiburg Scientists from Freiburg im Breisgau