[The Abbe Molina, the smallpox… and also Darwin]

Area of Science:

• History of Science
• Natural History
• Early Evolutionary Thought

Background:

• Ignacio Molina, a Chilean naturalist, had a significant career at the University of Bologna.
• He was expelled from the Jesuit Order in 1767.
• Molina's ideas on evolution predated Darwin and coincided with Lamarck's.

Purpose of the Study:

• To analyze two Latin elegies by Ignacio Molina detailing his experience with smallpox.
• To evaluate the historical and literary significance of Molina's poems.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of selected verses from Molina's Latin elegies: "De peste variolarum" and "De peste variolis vulgo dicta."
• Historical contextualization of Molina's life and scientific ideas.

Main Results:

• The poems vividly describe suffering from smallpox and ineffective/harmful treatments.
• Molina's early evolutionary ideas were expressed in his later works.
• The literary merit of the elegies is considered scarce, but their historical value is significant.

Conclusions:

• Ignacio Molina was an early thinker on evolution, contemporary to Lamarck.
• His personal accounts of smallpox offer historical insight into 18th-century medical practices.
• The primary value of Molina's elegies lies in their historical documentation rather than literary merit.