William Cullen - Materia Medica

Biography

Physician and lecturer on chemistry and materia medica at the University of Edinburgh. Cullen was born at Hamilton, Lanarkshire, the son of William Cullen and Elizabeth Robertson. Married (1741) to Anna Johnstone (d. 1786), with whom he had 11 children.

Cullen was educated at the University of Glasgow before, in 1729, he became surgeon on a merchant ship going to the West Indies. Upon his arrival back in London he worked for a time as assistant to an apothecary until, in the winter of 1731-32, he returned to Scotland. From 1737 to 1739 Cullen was Chief Magistrate of Hamilton. M.D. from Glasgow (1740). In 1751 he became Professor of Medicine at Glasgow, and in 1755 Professor of Chemistry at Edinburgh. In 1760 he began lecturing in Materia Medica as well. In 1766 he was elected Professor of the Theory of Physic, and from 1768 to 1773 he was joint lecturer, with John Gregory (d. 1773), in the practice of medicine, continuing as sole lecturer following Gregory's death. President of the Edinburgh College of Physicians (1773-1775). Fellow of the Royal Society of London (1777). He resigned his professorship on December 30, 1789, dying just a little more than a month later.

Cullen was the author of several works, including Synopsis Nosologiæ Methodicæ (1769), Institutions of Medicine, Part I. Physiology (1772), First Lines of the pratice of Physic (4 vols, 1776-1784) and A treatise of Materia Medica (1789).

Also known as

• Dr. Cullen

Life with James Boswell

Boswell attended his lecture at the University of Edinburgh on October 27, 1762. He described the occassion thus: "I liked him much, and I was highly amused to see a numerous audience of young physicians eager to receive instruction and full of the importance of their own profession."

On August 16, 1773, Cullen had supper with Boswell and Johnson in Edinburgh, shortly before the beginning of their tour to the Western Isles.

Notes

The main source for this article is the Dictionary of National Biography, which has an excellent article on Cullen. Available online at www.Ancestry.co.uk - sign up now for a free trial

Recommended literature

Cullen's works are hard to find today. A few books has been written about him, though, f.ex. Doig, Ferguson, Milne & Passmore's (1990) William Cullen and the Eighteenth Century Medical World (Read it now at Questia). A search for William Cullen in the title at AbeBooks may also yield a few results - be sure not to confuse him with poet William Cullen Bryant.

Mentioned in

William Cullen is mentioned in:

• Journal of my Jaunt, Harvest 1762