Clinical and Surgical Sciences (Surgery)
The History of the School of Surgery in
the University of Edinburgh
Surgical affairs in Edinburgh, including the practice and maintenance
of standards of the craft of surgery, were first vested in the Incorporation
of Barbers and Surgeons, who were awarded a Seal of Cause by the
City in 1505. Later (1778), the Incorporation became by charter
the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.
 The
story is told of how Scottish students wishing to study medicine
increasingly found their way to Lieden where Boerhaave had received
world-wide acclaim for his bedside teaching. It was from Lieden,
in the late seventeenth century, that John Munro brought back to
Edinburgh a determination to create a medical faculty within the
University of Edinburgh. This youngest of the Scottish Universities
lacked the papal imprimatur of the others, but this was largely
compensated by acceptance of the intellectual mandate of the people
of Edinburgh to form the "Town's College". The citizens
of Edinburgh were receptive to John Munro's idea and in 1726 appointed
the first six Professors in the Medical School, among them Alexander
Monro primus as Professor of Anatomy.
Surgery first became an academic discipline in Edinburgh in 1777 when his
son Alexander Monro secundus of was granted a commission by the Town
Council, "expressly bearing him to be Professor Medicine in particular
of Anatomy and Surgery". This arrangement did not meet with universal
approval, however, and the College of Surgeons in particular protested.
The controversy which ensued was partly responsible for the establishment
of a (Regius) Chair of Clinical Surgery by George III in 1803, although
the position became confused by the establishment by the Royal College
of Surgeons in 1804 of a Chair of Surgery and, in 1805, by the Regius
Chair of Military Surgery. Both these chairs were later discontinued
and the University established a second chair - the Chair of Systematic
(as opposed to Clinical) Surgery in 1831. Happily, relationships between
the University and the Royal College of Surgeons have improved greatly
over the years!
More
Information on King
James IV - the founder of Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh
Regius Chair of Clinical Surgery (1803 King George III) |
1803
- Professor James Russell |
1833
- Professor Sir James Syme |
1869
- Professor Joseph Lister |
1877
- Professor Sir Thomas Annandale |
1908
- Professor Francis Caird |
1919
- Professor Sir Harold Stiles |
1925
- Professor Sir John Fraser |
1946
- Professor Sir James Learnmonth |
1956
- Sir John Bruce |
1971
- Sir Patrick Forrest |
1988
- Professor Sir David Carter |
2000
- Professor O James Garden |
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