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January 3, 1779, Paris, France |
Claude Bourgelat (March 27, 1712 – January 3, 1779) was a French veterinary surgeon.
Bourgelat was born at Lyon. He was the founder of veterinary colleges at Lyon in 1761, as well as an authority on horse management, and often consulted on the matter. Other dates claimed for the establishment of the Lyon College, the first veterinary school in the world, are 1761 and 1764.
"Bourgelat, a French barrister, observing that certain maladies were devastating the French herds, forsook the bar and devoted his time in seeking out a remedy for the then pest, which resulted in his founding a veterinary college in Lyon in 1761, from which establishment he despatched students, with weapons in their hands all-necessary for combating disease by science with practice; and in a short time from this period, the plague was stayed and the health of stock restored, through the assistance rendered to agriculture by veterinary science and art." The plague to which Lupton referred was cattle plague, also commonly known by its German name, Rinderpest.
He was a member of the French Academy of Sciences and the Prussian Academy of Sciences.
Bourgelat also contributed to Diderot and d'Alambert's Encyclopedie.
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