Antoine Clot

Antoine Barthelemy Clot (1793-1868)

Portrait of Doctor Clot-Bey in Egyptian Army uniform.

Antoine Barthelemy Clot (7 November 1793 – 28 August 1868) was a French physician known as Clot Bey while practicing in Egypt.

Life

He was born at Grenoble, and graduated in medicine and surgery at Montpellier.

Efforts in Egypt

Clot Bey in Egyptian army uniform teaching the first modern Anatomy lesson at Abu-Zaabal on 20 June 1829. The lesson was attended by some Shiekhs from al-Azhar.

After practicing for a time at Marseilles he was made chief surgeon to Mehemet Ali, viceroy of Egypt. At Abu Zabal, near Cairo then Kasr Alaini, he founded a hospital and schools for all branches of medical instruction, as well as for the study of the French language; and, notwithstanding the most serious religious difficulties, instituted the study of anatomy (see his photo teaching^[1]) by means of dissection. In 1832 Mehemet Ali gave him the dignity of bey without requiring him to abjure his religion; and in 1836 he received the rank of general, and was appointed head of the medical administration of the country.

Return to France

In 1849 he returned to Marseilles, though he revisited Egypt in 1856.

End of life

Tomb of Clot-bey at Marsilles, France.

He died at Marseilles in 1868, aged 74.

His publications included:

• Relation des epidemies de cholera qui ont regne de l'Heggaz, a Suez, et en Egypte (1832)
• De La Peste observe en Egypte (1840)
• Apercu general sur l'Egypte (1840)
• Coup d'oeil sur la peste et les quarantaines (1851)
• De l'ophthalmie (1864)

Legacy

• A street in his hometown of Grenoble was named after him.
• A street in down town Cairo was named after him.^[2]
• Many statues of him are present at Kasr El Aini Hospital and in its museum.
• The thick-billed lark (Rhamphocoris clotbey), a North African and Middle Eastern desert bird, was named in Clot's honor by naturalist Charles Lucien Bonaparte.

References

1. "Photo of Clot Bey teaching anatomy". Al-Ahram Weekly. Archived from the original on 12 July 2008. Retrieved 11 July 2008.
2. "Clot Bey street in Egypt tour". National Geographic Traveler. Retrieved 12 July 2008.

3. Aboul-Enein BH & Puddy W. Contributions of Antoine Barthélémy Clot (1793-1868): A historiographical reflection of public health in Ottoman Egypt. Journal of Medical Biography, 2015. doi: 10.1177/0967772015584708

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.