Collections of the University Medical Center

Blumenbach Skull Collection
Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (1752 – 1840) was a young Professor of Medicine at the Medical Faculty of Göttingen University when he started to focus his anatomical research on the human skull. His medical thesis De generis humani varietate nativa, published in 1776, had immediately received international recognition as a groundbreaking contribution to eighteenth century anthropology. With the help of many colleagues, pupils and friends from all over the world, he gradually assembled the largest skull collection in existence anywhere in the world at the time. The collection was regarded as a systematic reference collection for Physical Anthropology, but it also included many skulls and plaster casts with an exceptional individual history. After Blumenbach’s death his collection – consisting of at least 230 skulls – was acquired by the University and substantially extended by the Göttingen anatomists in the years that followed. Today, it contains 840 items and is, to our knowledge, the oldest and largest skull collection held in a university setting in the world. more...





Human Embryology Collection ('Blechschmidt Collection')
The Human Embryology Collection at the Centre of Anatomy was established in 1946 by Prof. Erich Blechschmidt (1904-1992), Director of Göttingen University’s Anatomical Institute from 1942 until 1973. The collection contains (1) more than 300 series of histological sections from the early stages of human prenatal development, and (2) 64 large-scale three-dimensional models (as shown) constructed on the basis of serial sections and known as the “Humanembryologische Dokumentationssammlung Blechschmidt”. The collection was created with the aim of analysing and documenting structural changes during early prenatal human development by demonstrating the external and internal anatomy of the human embryo, which is inaccessible to the naked eye. more...




Collection on the History of Perinatal Medicine
The department of Ethics and History of Medicine contains an important teaching collection on the history of academic perinatal medicine. The exhibition as it is presented today in the lower ground floor of the department of Ethics and History of Medicine was conceptualised and implemented in 1995 by the midwife and ethnologist Christine Loytved. It shows a.o. wax models with anatomical depictions of the woman, birthing tongs and levers, guiding and turning rods, the Steinian birthing stool in a reproduction as well as different maternity bed models and tools for postpartum care. more...





Collection Heinz Kirchhoff: Symbols of the Feminine
Female statues showing women during pregnancy, in birth or in their different functions as a mother are found in most epochs and civilizations in our world. Naturalistic, reduced to symbols, stylized, embodied in clay, stone or wood: their function and meaning is as different as the times and cultures themselves.

Heinz Kirchhoff(1905-1997), director of the department of gynaecology and obstetrics of the University Hospital of Göttingen from 1953 to 1973, was devoted to this special field as a passionate collector .His collection comprises roughly 650 items and shows recurring symbols and exposures of feminism throughout the cultural history.

The permanent exhibition in the University Hospital shows a selected variety of this outstanding collection: from mothergodness of the prehistoric history and African cult objects to fertility symbols and modern sculptures .
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Göttingen Collection of Medical Moulages
Skin conditions render pain externally visible for all. The detailed wax casts of body parts and areas of skin changed by disease are called moulages, from the French mouler – to mould. They are designed to reproduce form, colour and texture of the diseased body part as close to life as possible to be able to document diagnostic findings. The moulages were used as objects in teaching, demonstrating and collecting. Many moulages were produced by internationally renowned moleurs: Lotte Volger, Zürich; Alfons Kröner, Breslau; Fritz Kolbow, R. Henning, Wien. more...