726 



BORN. 



Bom. BORN, Inigo, Baron, a celebrated German- mi- 



neralogist, was born of a noble family at Carlsburg, 

 in /Transylvania, on the 26th of December 1712. 

 At an early period of life he came to Vienna, where 

 he studied in the college of the Jesuits, who, per- 

 ceiving the talents of their pupil, prevailed upon him 

 to enter into their order. After rvmaining a year and 

 a half in this society, he went from Vienna to Prague, 

 where, according to the custom of the Germans, he 

 studied the law. Having completed his course of 

 education, he set out on a tour through Hungary, 

 part of Germany, Holland, the Netherlands, and 

 France, and upon his return to Prague he began the 

 study of natural history and mining, and was received 

 in 1770 into the department of the mines and mint 

 of that city. About the beginning of June 1770, Born 

 set out on a mineralogical tour through the Bannat 

 of Temeswar, Transylvania, and Hungary, of which 

 he gave a detailed account in a series of twenty-three 

 letters addressed to the celebrated Ferber, who pub- 

 lished them in 1774-. This work was translated from 

 the German by R. E. Raspe, and published at London 

 in 1777. In the first of these letters, dated Temes- 

 war, 14th June 1770, he complains of the loss which 

 he sustained in being ignorant of botany, owing to 

 the want of public institutions in which this science 

 might be taught. " Had I," says he, " besides my 

 little mineralogical science, some knowledge in bo- 

 tany, my three days travelling over barren heaths, 

 from Ofen to Segiden, and thence to Temeswar, 

 might have perhaps procured me an opportunity to 

 entertain you at least with the names and descrip- 

 tions of some plants. But, alas ! I am no botanist, 

 though that is not my fault. You well know how 

 fond I am of natural history : but I never met with 

 any proper opportunity to improve in this part of 

 science. Except at Vienna, there is no academy in 

 all the Austrian States in which botany is taught ; 

 nay even at Vienna there is no professor of natural 

 history. For this reason, you need rot be astonish- 

 ed that natural history is entirely unnoticed and ne- 

 flected in Austria, while the English, French, 

 wedes, and Russians, for the sake of useful science, 

 examine their own and the remotest countries in the 

 world. But to what purpose these complaints ? 

 You may guess by them the dissatisfaction that will 

 attend me in my journey through the mountains of 

 Bannat, Transylvania, and part of the Carpathian 

 hills. All the riches of Flora, during the finest sea- 

 son of the year, displayed in those parts, will be 

 scarce at all enjoyed by me." 



Born continued his travels till the beginning of 

 August 1770, when he had nearly lost his life by de- 

 scending into a mine at Feko-Banya, which brought 

 upon him a disease that embittered the remainder 

 of his life. This accident is so well described in his 

 letter to Ferber of the 22d August 1770, that we 

 are induced to give it in his own words, " My 

 long silence," says he, " is the consequence of an un- 

 happy accident which was very near putting :.! end 

 to my life. To examine the common firing of 

 Felso-Banya, and the great effects produced by so 

 small an expellee of wood, I visited the great mine 

 when the fire was hardly burnt down, and when the 

 mine was -still filled with smoke. An accident made 



me tarry somewhat longer in the shaft, hy which the 

 smoke went off. In short, I lost my senses, and fif- 

 teen hours after, I was restored to myself by blisters 

 and other applications. My lips were swoln, my 

 eyes run with blood, and rrly limbs in general lamed. 

 Without the assistance of a skilful, young physician at 

 Nagy-Banya, and the great care of the upper adminis- 

 tration inspector Baron Gerham, in whose house I 

 lodge, you would have been deprived of your friend ; 

 and the question is still, whether he is to be saved. 

 A violent coughing, and acute paius in the loins, 

 wdiich alternately put me on the rack, are, I fear, 

 more than sufficient to destroy this thinly framed 

 machine. If that should be the case, then, my friend, 

 I desire you to have my name at least inserted in the 

 martyrology of naturalists." In this wretched state 

 of health, Born travelled with great pain from Nagy- 

 Banya to Schemniz, where he arrived in the begin- 

 ning of September, and where his family at that time 

 resided. Here he remained during the month of 

 September ; and in the beginning of October be 

 set out for Vienna, partly for the purpose of obtain- 

 ing medical assistance. In 1771 he went to Prague, 

 where he was appointed counsellor of the royal mines 

 in Bohemia, and where he published, in 1771, a trea- 

 tise written by the Jesuit Poda on Mining Machinery. 

 In 1772, he published his Lithophj/laciitm Borneo- 

 man, or a catalogue of his collection of fossils, wdiich 

 he afterwards sold to the honourable Mr Greville for 

 1000. 



The reputation of Born now began to extend, aud 

 he was honoured with the correspondence of some of 

 the first mineralogists of the age. He was elected a 

 member of the Royal Societies of Stockholm, Sien- 

 na, and Padua ; and in 1774 he was chosen a fellow 

 of the Royal Society of London. 



The talents of Born were not confined to mineralo- 

 gy alone. He had a taste for general literature, 

 which he displayed, not only in his writings, but in 

 the active zeal with which he -laboured to inspire his 

 countrymen with a taste for learning. He contribu- 

 ted largely to a work entitled AbblMungen Bohmis- 

 cher unci Mahrischer Gelehrien undKwutlfr, or, Por- 

 traits of the /earned Men and Artists of Bohemia anil 

 Moravia. He likewise wrote in the Acta Literaria 

 Bohemias et Moravia: He induced government to 

 form a public cabinet for the use of the students at 

 Prague and Vienna ; and, in 1775, he founded a lite- 

 rary society at Prague, wdiich has published several 

 volumes, under the title of Abhandlungcn einer Pri- 

 vatgesellscliaft in Bohmen, or, Memoirs of a private 

 Society in Bohemia. 



The fame of Bom was now so great, that, in the 

 year 177G, he was called to Vienna by the Empress 

 Maria Theresa, to arrange and describe the imperial 

 collection. In 1778, he published the conchology 

 of this collection in a splendid work, the expense of 

 which was partly defrayed by the empress herself. 

 On the death of the empress the work was disconti- 

 nued, in consequence of the parsimony of her succes- 

 sor, Joseph II. Some time afterwards, Born was 

 chosen to instruct in natural history the Archdu- 

 chess Maria Anna, for whom he formed an elegant 

 museum, in consequence of these services, he was , 

 promoted to the office of actual counsellor to the 



Born. 



