(possessor)

Pápai Páriz, Ferenc, Jr.
(1687-1740), Transylvanian physician

Ferenc Pápai Páriz Jr. was born in Nagyenyed (Aiud) on May 1, 1687, the son of Ferenc P. P., Sen. (1649-1716) and Anna Szeghalmi (?-1691). After the early death of his mother he was taken care by his stepmother. He began his schools in Nagyenyed, and at the age of ten he was sent to Nagyszeben (Sibiu) to learn German. He was immatriculated in the College of Nagyenyed in 1703, and in the following year he lived through the destruction of the College by Austrian mercenaries and the thereafter following exile. In the register of the College he is mentioned as “Salutavit acad. med. discendi causa, Ao. 1711 Mense Aug.”, that is, in 1711 he went abroad. He studied in Halle, and in 1714 he was graduated in medicine. In 1715 he continued his studies in Leiden, and played an eminent role in obtaining here stipends for a number of other students from Nagyenyed. In 1718 he was immatriculated in Franeker. Then he crossed the Channel together with András Ajtai, supported by letters of recommendation from the professors of Nagyenyed, to collect funds for the rebuilding of the College. During the ten years spent in England he collected a remarkable sum. The largest part of it, nearly 7000 pound sterlings, was deposited in English accounts, and served for the Bethlen College of Nagyenyed until the 1850's to send its students to studies abroad, as well as for developing the College itself. The stay of Ferenc Páriz Pápai in England was broken only for a shorter travel to Switzerland and the Netherlands in 1719. In 1726 he returned to Transylvania. He is said to have lost a part of the money collected, either on lottery or on the stock-market in France.

At home he worked as the county's official physician. He married Erzsébet Diószegi, the widow of Tamás Aczél and the mother of the physician Gábor Aczél. He purchased an estate in Tiszafüred, and kept a respected household. He died, together with his wife, in the plague of 1737 or 1740. Their children died in an early age. His only medical treatise is: Dissertatio medico-practica de therapia morborum morali. Halle, 1714.

The stations of his one and half decade long peregrination are well indicated by the notes in his Album, as well as in his letters written mainly to his maecenas, Count Sándor Teleki. The main stations of this long travel were: 1711 Nagyenyed, Kolozsvár (Cluj), Vienna, Berlin; 1712 Halle; 1713 Berlin, Halle; 1714 Berlin, Hamburg, Bremen, Amsterdam, Utrecht, The Hague; 1715 Leiden, London; 1716 Oxford, Cambridge; 1717 London; 1719 York, Norwich, Geneva, Bern, Zürich, Basel, Leiden, Franeker; 1720 London; 1725 Leiden, Frankfurt am Main, Regensburg; 1726 Vienna. – Count Teleki has written in the Album still in his castle of Gernyeszeg (Gorneşti) (p. 85.). György Rettegi (1718-1786), the later possessor of the Album (p. 477), was the brother-in-law of the forementioned Gábor Aczél: probably this is how he got in possession of it [Emődi]. – The year of the death of Ferenc Páriz Pápai is given as 1737 in his biographies, probably on the base of Weszprémi. Rettegi, however, mentions 1740 in his memoires [Rettegi-Jakó 71, Rettegi-Jancsó 56]. The year of his birth is also uncertain: Weszprémi writes May 1, 1689, while Makkai May 1, 1687. Nevertheless, in February 15, 1715 he was registered in the matricules of the University of Leiden as being 24 years old. On the same day was immatriculated also his friend, András Ajtai, who had made his note in the Album in Kolozsvár in 1711 (p. 451.).

• AlbFran 312 • AlbLeid 840 • Emődi • Graaf 64 • Jakó-Juhász 123 • Makkai • Peregrinus • Szabó-Szögi 362 • Weszprémi III 304, 504