[The heyday of epileptology]

The clinical symptoms of most types of epileptic seizures were already described in 1770 by Tissot. During the first half of the 19th century, his teaching was further developed and the nomenclature of epilepsy enriched. Rolando's description of the cortical convolutions as well as Bouchet's and Cazauvielh's observation of anatomical changes in the Ammon's horn of epileptic patients with psychical disturbances have prepared the way for the discovery of the role of local brain pathology as the cause of partial seizures. During the second half of the 19th century, Fritsch, Hitzig and Ferrier, by means of animal experiments, and Jackson, by means of clinical observation, discovered the motor function of the precentral cortex and that its irritation results in contralateral seizures. Independent of each other, Jackson and Sommer recognized that the initiation of what we nowadays call psychomotor or complex partial seizures lies within the limbic system. Caton's method of investigation brain currents in animal experiments, described in 1875, make possible in the 20th century to confirm Jackson's theory of epileptic seizures as sudden excessive discharges of the grey matter of the brain. Further advances of 19th century epileptology include: the etiological reclassification of epilepsies by Delasiauve, the first effective pharmacological (Bromide) and surgical therapies for epilepsy, the publication of classic textbooks on epilepsy by Gowers and Herpin as well as the setting up of specialized treatment centres for epilepsy.