Mineralogical–Petrographical Collection

Since 1819 there has been a chair of Mineralogy at the University of Giessen. The subject was taught even earlier. The first textbook of mineralogy was also written here. The privy high councilman Andreas Ludwig August Emmerling (1765-1842) wrote it in 1793. A well-known representative of Giessen mineralogy is Reinhard Brauns, who held a chair of Mineralogy and Geology at the Ludoviciana from 1895 to 1904. Most of the surviving crystallographic instruments date from this period. Some, like the reflectance goniometer shown below, are even older. During the Second World War, the Mineralogical–Petrographical Institute was also hit. Only the instruments and books stored in the basement were preserved. With the dissolution of the Geoscience Department in 2005, the Mineralogical–Petrographical Collection disappeared for a while. It has been a great stroke of luck for the history of the university and science that part of the collection was preserved and is accessible again today. A total of ten historical crystallographic instruments from approx. 1850-1920 can be viewed in the Hermann Hoffmann Academy after consultation with the collection coordinator.

Contact
Collection coordinator