Paracelsus

Who was Paracelsus?

Paracelsus was a Swiss German Renaissance physician, botanist, alchemist, astrologer, and general occultist. He founded the discipline of Toxicology. He is also known as a revolutionary for insisting upon using observations of nature, rather than looking to ancient texts, in open and radical defiance of medical practice of his day. He is also credited for giving zinc its name, calling it zincum. Modern psychology often also credits him for being the first to note that some diseases are rooted in psychological illness.

His personality was stubborn and independent. He grew progressively more frustrated and bitter as he became more embattled as a reformer.

"Paracelsus", meaning "next to Celsus", refers to the Roman encyclopedist Aulus Cornelius Celsus from the 1st century, known for his tract on medicine.

Paracelsus' most important legacy is likely his critique of the scholastic methods in medicine, science and theology.