III.

Career

Freud’s medical education began in Vienna in 1873 when he was 17. At 20, he was drawn to further study of the central nervous system under the tutelage of the German neurologist Ernst Wilhelm von Brücke. This delayed his graduation in medicine until 1881, by which time he was 25 and had also completed a year of compulsory military service. He remained at the university as a demonstrator in the physiology laboratory continuing his wide-ranging studies, which included researches into the drug cocaine, and the condition of cerebral palsy. He explored the neurophysiology of aphasia and agnosia, terms he applied to the neurological disorders of communication and recognition. Largely at von Brücke’s insistence, Freud relinquished his research interests temporarily to gain clinical experience in psychiatry, dermatology, and nervous diseases, as resident physician to the General Hospital of Vienna. After three years he was to return to the university, where he was appointed lecturer in neuropathology.