[P.E. Flechsig's contribution to a Russian-German scientific exchange in the fields of neuropathology and psychiatry]. / Vklad P.É. Fleksiga v rossiisko-nemetskoe nauchnoe sotrudnichestvo v oblasti nevrologii i psikhiatrii.

The University of Leipzig has played an important role in the Russian-German scientific exchange in the fields of psychiatry and neurology in the 19th century. An outstanding but almost forgotten protagonist of that exchange was the psychiatrist and neurologist Paul Flechsig, who enjoyed worldwide recognition for his neuroanatomical works. Famous Russian neurologists and psychiatrists as Vladimir Bekhterev, Liverij Osipovich Darkshevich, Vladimir Chizh not only learned from Flechsig's experience, but also undertook independent research, which gave them impulses for furthering their carriers in Russia.

[Victor Khrisanfovich Kandinsky (1849-1889) : Contributions of a Russian psychiatrist to the concepts of pseudohallucination and schizophrenias]. / Viktor Chrisanfovic Kandinskij (1849­1889) : Beiträge eines russischen Psychiaters zu den Konzepten der Pseudohalluzination und der Schizophrenien.

The article highlights the important work of the Russian psychiatrist Victor Khrisanfovich Kandinsky. His merits, in particular those in the fields of hallucinations and schizophrenias, have hitherto been neglected despite the fact that several of his articles have been published in German medical journals. He defined the term pseudohallucination in a way which is still common today. For him the criterion which separates it from real hallucinations was that the patient is aware of the fallacy of the phenomena perceived. Furthermore, his concept of ideophrenia can be regarded as a one of the precursors to today's concept of schizophrenias.

[The impartiality of ignorance? - A controversy between Paul Julius Möbius and Julius Wagner-Jauregg on the symptoms of reanimated persons after a suicide attempt through self-hanging]. / Die Unbefangenheit der Unwissenheit? - Ein Richtungsstreit zwischen Paul Julius Möbius und Julius Wagner-Jauregg über die Symptome wiederbelebter Erhängter.

INTRODUCTION: Between 1891 and 1893 the famous Austrian and German neuropsychiatrists Julius Wagner-Jauregg and Paul Julius Möbius disputed in leading German and Austrian medical journals about mental and physiological changes and symptoms in people who after strangulation could be revived in time to survive. Their dispute even touched personal issues. METHODS: For the study, the original sources were studied and contrasted with relevant secondary sources. RESULTS: The dispute was mainly about two opposing concepts: On the one hand, Wagner-Jauregg supported an organic, neurological concept; on the other hand a psychoreactive-symptoms concept represented by Möbius and elaborated by him first in his concept of hysteria. DISCUSSION: The study elaborates these factual differences in completely different approaches to psychiatry and - at least in the case of Möbius - how a medical theory was embedded into a pre-existing philosophical system. CONSEQUENCES: The dispute studied discusses a philosophical problem which has remained incompletely understood until the present day - the relationship of body and mind. Hence the study on this dispute is more than just an interesting aspect in the history of sciences, but rather the illustration of a meeting of two opponents in a still relevant discussion.

[The concept of reflex psychosis: roots, importance and assessment in psychiatric and philosophical context]. / Das Konzept der Reflexpsychose : Entstehung, Bedeutung und Wertung im psychiatrisch-philosophischen Kontext.

Reflex psychosis is a pathogenetic concept of the nineteenth century which has its roots in development of the concept of a reflex arc and its transfer to the understanding of psychiatric diseases. Reflex psychosis stands for different mental disorders caused by a peripheral affection, mostly of the skin, which alters brain function with subsequent psychosis. The concept of reflex psychosis also had an impact in questions of the problem of body and soul. Connections to Descartes' mechanistic theory and humoral pathology are discussed. In addition it influences modern psychiatric models, e.g. the vulnerability-stress concept. When the disease concept was first developed, pro and con arguments occupied neurologists, psychiatrists, pathologists and physicians from other specializations too. In Germany important exponents were Griesinger, Koeppe, Flemming and Schüle. This article deals with the phenomenology, development and fate of this concept.

[Peculiarities of schizophrenic diseases in prelingually deaf persons]. / Besonderheiten schizophrener Erkrankungen bei prälingual Ertaubten.

Diagnostic criteria of schizophrenia, according to Kurt Schneider's first and second range symptoms appear in spoken language. This raises the question of how symptoms of schizophrenia are manifested in prelingually deaf people who mainly communicate with sign language. The article shows that acoustic hallucinations of normal hearing schizophrenic people correspond to visual and tactile hallucinations of the prelingually deaf. An additional similarity is found in a disorder of the structure of the language. These similarities show that schizophrenia does not depend on the acoustic part of language or the acquisition of spoken language.