Ole Worm

Ole Worm (May 13, 1588 – August 31, 1654), (pronounced "Olay Vorm") who often went by the Latinized form of his name Olaus Wormius, was a Danish physician and antiquary. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (425x649, 203 KB) Please see the file description page for further information. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (425x649, 203 KB) Please see the file description page for further information. ... May 13 is the 133rd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (134th in leap years). ... Events May 12 - Day of the Barricades in Paris. ... August 31 is the 243rd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (244th in leap years), with 122 days remaining, as the final day of August. ... Events April 5 - Signing of the Treaty of Westminster, ending the First Anglo-Dutch War. ... A physician is a person who practices medicine. ... An antiquarian is one concerned with antiquities or things of the past. ...

Life

Worm was the son of Willum Worm who served as the mayor of Aarhus, and was made a rich man by the inheritance from his father. Ole Worm's grandfather Johan Worm, a magistrate in Aarhus, was a Lutheran who had fled from Arnhem in Gelderland while it was under Catholic rule. View of Aarhus from the harbor. ... The Lutheran movement is a group of denominations of Protestant Christianity by the original definition. ... Arnhem is a municipality and a city in the east of the Netherlands, located on the Lower Rhine and the capital of the Gelderland province. ... Capital Arnhem Queens Commissioner Jan Kamminga Area  - Total  - % water 2nd 5137 km²  ?% Population  - Total (2004)  - Density 4th 1,966,929 379/km² Anthem Ons Gelderland For the historical duchy also called Gelderland, see Guelders Gelderland (English also Guelders) is a province of the Netherlands, located in the central eastern...

Ole Worm was something of a perpetual student: after attending the grammar school of Aarhus, he continued his education at the University of Marburg in 1605, received his Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Basel in 1611, and received a Master of Arts degree from the University of Copenhagen in 1617. The rest of his academic career was spent in Copenhagen, where he taught Latin, Greek, physics, and medicine. He was personal physician to King Christian V of Denmark. Somewhat remarkable for a physician of the time, he remained in the city of Copenhagen to minister to the sick during an epidemic of the Black Death. A perpetual student, also known as professional student, is a college or university attendee who re-enrolls for several years, typically more than what is necessary to obtain a given degree. ... A grammar school is a type of school found in some English-speaking countries. ... The University of Marburg, officially called Philipps-Universität Marburg after its founder, the Landgrave Philipp I of Hesse (usually called the Magnanimous), was founded in 1527 and is the worlds first and oldest Protestant university. ... Events April 13 - Tsar Boris Godunow dies - Feodor II accedes to the throne May 16 - Paul V becomes Pope June 1 - Russian troops in Moscow imprison Feodor II and his mother. ... The University of Basel (German: Universität Basel) is located at Basel, Switzerland. ... Events November 1 - At Whitehall Palace in London, William Shakespeares romantic comedy The Tempest is presented for the first time. ... University of Copenhagen The University of Copenhagen (Danish: Københavns Universitet) is the oldest and largest university and research institution in Copenhagen, Denmark. ... Events Change of emperor of the Ottoman Empire from Ahmed I (1603-1617) to Mustafa I (1617-1623). ... Latin is the language originally spoken in the region around Rome called Latium. ... The willingness to question previously held truths and search for new answers resulted in a period of major scientific advancements, now known as the Scientific Revolution. ... Medicine is a branch of health science concerned with maintaining health and restoring it by treating disease. ... Christian V (April 15, 1646 - August 25, 1699), was king of Denmark and Norway from 1670-1699. ... Å·An epidemic is generally a widespread disease that affects many individuals in a population. ... Bubonic plague is an infectious disease that is believed to have caused several epidemics or pandemics throughout history. ...

Scientific and cultural significance

In medicine, Worm's chief contributions were in embryology. The Wormian bones (small bones that fill gaps in the cranial sutures) are named after him. Embryology is the subdivision of developmental biology that studies embryos and their development. ... A Hippopotamuss skull A skull, or cranium, is a bony structure of vertebrates which serves as the general framework for a head. ... Sutures are the stitches doctors, and especially surgeons, use to hold skin, organs, blood vessels and all other tissues of the human body together, after they have been severed in minor or major surgery. ...

Worm is also known as a collector of early literature in the Scandinavian languages. He also wrote a number of treatises on runestones and collected texts that were written in the runic alphabet. Worm received letters of introduction to the bishops of Denmark and Norway from the King of Denmark due to the King's interest and approval. In 1626 Worm published his Fasti Danici, or "Danish Chronology," containing the results of his researches into runic lore; and in 1636 he followed this up with Runir seu Danica literatura antiquissima, "Runes: the oldest Danish literature," a compilation of transcribed runic texts. Open Directory Project: Literature World Literature Electronic Text Archives Magazines and E-zines Online Writing Writers Resources Libraries, Digital Cataloguing, Metadata Distance Learning Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Classicism in Literature The Universal Library, by Carnegie Mellon University Project Gutenberg Online Library Abacci - Project Gutenberg texts matched with Amazon... The Scandinavian languages are the three mutually intelligible North Germanic languages spoken in Scandinavia: Danish, Norwegian and Swedish. ... A rune can mean a single character in the Runic alphabet as well as an inscription of several runic charcters or symbols. ... Technical note: Due to technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... An alphabet is a complete standardized set of letters—basic written symbols—each of which roughly represents a phoneme of a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it may have been in the past. ... A bishop is an ordained member of the Christian clergy who, in certain Christian churches, holds a position of authority. ... Events September 30 - Nurhaci, chieftain of the Jurchens and founder of the Qing Dynasty dies and is succeeded by his son Hong Taiji. ... Events February 24 - King Christian of Denmark gives an order that all beggars that are able to work must be sent to Brinholmen Island to build ships or as galley rowers March 26 - Utrecht University founded in The Netherlands. ...

"Musei Wormiani Historia," the frontispiece from the Museum Wormianum depicting Wormius' cabinet of curiosities.

As a natural philosopher, Worm assembled a great collection of curiosities, which ranged from native artifacts collected from the New World, to taxidermed animals, to fossils, on which he speculated greatly. Worm compiled engravings of his collection, along with his speculations about their meaning, into a catalog of his Museum Wormianum, published after his death, in 1655. As a scientist, Worm straddled the line between modern and pre-modern. As an example, in a very modern, empirical mode, Worm determined that the unicorn did not exist and that purported unicorn horns were really simply from the narwhal. At the same time, however, he then wondered if the anti-poison properties associated with a unicorn's horn still held true, and undertook primitive experiments in poisoning pets and then serving them ground up narwhal horn (his poisoning must have been relatively mild because he reported that they did recover). His other empirical investigations included providing convincing evidence that lemmings were rodents and not, as some thought, spontaneously generated by the air, and also by providing the first detailed drawing of a bird of paradise proving that they did, despite much popular speculation to the opposite, indeed have feet like regular birds. Worm's primary use of his natural history collection was for the purpose of pedagogy. Ole Worms cabinet of curiosities, from Museum Wormianum, 1655. ... Ole Worms cabinet of curiosities, from Museum Wormianum, 1655. ... Musei Wormiani Historia, the frontispiece from the Museum Wormianum depicting Ole Worms cabinet of curiosities. ... Natural philosophy is a term applied to the objective study of nature and the physical universe before the development of modern science. ... Musei Wormiani Historia, the frontispiece from the Museum Wormianum depicting Ole Worms cabinet of curiosities. ... Taxidermy (Greek for the arrangement of the skin) is the art of mounting or reproducing animals for display or study. ... A fossil Ammonite Fossils are the mineralized remains of animals or plants or other traces such as footprints. ... Events New Sweden (Delaware) attacked and captured by Dutch forces. ... Empiricism (greek εμπειρισμός, from empirical, latin experientia - the experience) is generally regarded as being at the heart of the modern scientific method, that our theories should be based on our observations of the world rather than on intuition or faith; that is, empirical research and a posteriori inductive reasoning rather... The gentle and pensive virgin has the power to tame the unicorn, in this fresco in Palazzo Farnese, Rome, probably by Domenichino, ca 1602 The unicorn is a legendary creature shaped like a horse, but slender and with a single — usually spiral — horn growing out of its forehead. ... Binomial name Monodon monoceros Linnaeus, 1758 Narwhal range The Narwhal (Monodon monoceros) is an Arctic species of cetacean with a body similar to that of a dolphin. ... See also: Lemmings (computer game) Genera Dicrostonyx Lemmus Synaptomys Myopus  * Incomplete listing: see vole Lemmings are small rodents, usually found in or near the Arctic. ... For the flowering plant of this name, see Strelitzia Genera Cicinnurus Diphyllodes Epimachus Lophorina Manucodia Paradisaea Parotia Ptiloris Seleucidis Lesser Bird of Paradise Paradisaea minor (c)Roderick Eime The birds of paradise are members of the family Paradisaeidae of the order Passeriformes, found in Oceania. ... Pedagogy is the art or science of teaching. ...

Worm in popular literature

In more recent years, the real Worm (and his various accomplishments) have been supplanted to many by a fictional character with his name. H. P. Lovecraft created the character Olaus Wormius as a translator from Arabic into Latin of his notorious fictional grimoire, the Necronomicon. Lovecraft also writes him as a Dominican priest, and misplaces him in the thirteenth century. A fictional character is any person who does appear in a work of fiction. ... H. P. Lovecraft Howard Phillips Lovecraft (August 20, 1890 – March 15, 1937) was an American author of fantasy and horror fiction, noted for giving horror stories a science fiction framework. ... Arabic (العربية) is a Semitic language, closely related to Hebrew and Aramaic. ... Latin is the language originally spoken in the region around Rome called Latium. ... This article is on medieval books of magic; for information on the term grimoire as used in the Source Mage GNU/Linux operating system, see the Source Mage article. ... The Necronomicon (Greek: Νεκρονομικόν) is a fictional book of magic, invented by H. P. Lovecraft and frequently featured in his Cthulhu mythos tales. ... Roman Catholic priest LCDR Allen R. Kuss (USN) aboard USS Enterprise A priest or priestess is a holy man or woman who takes an officiating role in worship of any religion, with the distinguishing characteristic of offering sacrifices. ... (12th century - 13th century - 14th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 13th century was that century which lasted from 1201 to 1300. ...

External links

• Ole Worm
• Ole Worm's Museum, full of anatomical and biological curiosities
• Computus Runicus. a Runic calendar collected by Wormius in Gotlandia.