PHILIPPE

PINEL (1745–1826)  , French physician, was born at the chateau of Rascas, Saint-Andre, in the department of Tarn, France, on the loth of April 1745 . He studied at Lavaur and afterwards at the university of Toulouse, where he took his doctor's degree in 1773 . From Montpellier he removed in 1778 to Paris, engaging there chiefly in literary work connected with his profession . His first publication was a French translation of William Cullen's Nosology (1785); it was followed by an edition of the works of G . Baglivi (1788), and in 1791 he published a Traite medico-philosophique de l'alienation mentale . In 1792 he became head physician of the Bicetre, and two years after-wards he received the corresponding appointment at the Salpetriere, where he began to deliver a course of clinical lectures; these formed the basis of his Nosographie philosophique (1798; 6th ed., 1818), which was further developed in La Medecine clinique (1802) . Pinel was made a member of the Institute in 1803, and soon afterwards was appointed professor of pathology in the Ecole de Medecine . His fame rests entirely upon the fact that he was among the first to introduce the humane treatment of the insane . He died at Paris on the 26th of October 1826 .