Jacob Kolloman Freud (; 1 April 1815 – 23 October 1896) was the father of
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies seen as originating fro ...
, the founder of
psychoanalysis
PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...
.
Born in town of
Tysmenytsia in the
Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria
The Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, also known as Austrian Galicia or colloquially Austrian Poland, was a constituent possession of the Habsburg monarchy in the historical region of Galicia (Eastern Europe), Galicia in Eastern Europe. The Cr ...
(now in
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...
), and from a
Hasidic
Hasidism () or Hasidic Judaism is a religious movement within Judaism that arose in the 18th century as a spiritual revival movement in contemporary Western Ukraine before spreading rapidly throughout Eastern Europe. Today, most of those aff ...
background though himself an enlightened Jew of the
Haskalah
The ''Haskalah'' (; literally, "wisdom", "erudition" or "education"), often termed the Jewish Enlightenment, was an intellectual movement among the Jews of Central Europe, Central and Eastern Europe, with a certain influence on those in Wester ...
, he mainly earned his living as a wool merchant.
Families
Jacob Freud was the son of Schlomo Freud and Pepi, née Hoffmann. Jacob Freud married three times, with two children coming from his first marriage, and eight children from his third marriage to
Amalia Freud
Amalia Malka Nathansohn Freud ( Nathansohn; 18 August 1835 – 12 September 1930) was the mother of Sigmund Freud. She was born in Brody in the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria to Jakob Nathanson and Sara Wilenz and later grew up in Odesa, where ...
, twenty years his junior. His first wife was Sally, and his second wife was Rebecca. Jacob's eldest son from his first marriage became a father a year before Sigmund - the first son of Jacob's third marriage - was born; so that Sigmund was an uncle at birth, with his nephew John a constant (and older) playmate in his early years.
Ernest Jones speculates that the unusual family background may have prompted Sigmund - the eldest but third son - into an early interest in family dynamics.
Character
By all accounts, Jacob Freud was a genial, unassuming character with a "
Micawberish" streak of optimism:
Sigmund would write warmly of "his characteristic mixture of deep wisdom and fantastic lightheartedness". Yet Jacob's
meekness in the face of
antisemitic
Antisemitism or Jew-hatred is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Whether antisemitism is considered a form of racism depends on the school of thought. Antisemi ...
bullying
Bullying is the use of force, coercion, Suffering, hurtful teasing, comments, or threats, in order to abuse, aggression, aggressively wikt:domination, dominate, or intimidate one or more others. The behavior is often repeated and habitual. On ...
also disturbed Sigmund profoundly. Much of the latter's ambition, his combativeness, and his subsequent quest for powerful father figures such as
Ernst Wilhelm von Brücke and
Josef Breuer
Josef Breuer ( ; ; 15 January 1842 – 20 June 1925) was an Austrian physician who made discoveries in neurophysiology, and whose work during the 1880s with his patient Bertha Pappenheim, known as Anna O., led to the development of the "cathart ...
, may be traced back to his
ambivalence
Ambivalence is a state of having simultaneous conflicting reactions, beliefs, or feelings towards some object. Stated another way, ambivalence is the experience of having an attitude towards someone or something that contains both positively and n ...
about his own yielding and 'vague' father.
[Peter Homans, ''Jung in Context'' (1979) p. 149]
See also
*
Father complex
Father complex in psychology is a complex—a group of unconscious associations, or strong unconscious impulses—which specifically pertains to the image or archetype of the father. These impulses may be either positive (admiring and seeking out ...
*
Family nexus
In psychology, a family nexus is a common viewpoint held and reinforced by the majority of family members regarding events in the family and relationships with the world. The term was coined by R. D. Laing, who believed that this nexus "exists on ...
*
Freud family
The family of Sigmund Freud, the pioneer of psychoanalysis, lived in Austria and Germany until the 1930s before emigrating to England, Canada, and the United States. Several of Freud's descendants and relatives have become well known in different ...
*
Wilhelm Fliess
Wilhelm Fliess ( ; 24 October 1858 – 13 October 1928) was a German otolaryngologist who practised in Berlin. He developed the pseudoscientific theory of human biorhythms and a possible nasogenital connection that have not been accepted by ...
References
Further reading
*Marianne Krüll, ''Freud and his Father'' (1979)
*
Leonard Shengold, 'Freud and Josef', in M. Kanzer ed, ''The Unconscious Today'' (1971)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Freud, Jacob
1815 births
1896 deaths
People from Tysmenytsia
Jacob
Jacob, later known as Israel, is a Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions. He first appears in the Torah, where he is described in the Book of Genesis as a son of Isaac and Rebecca. Accordingly, alongside his older fraternal twin brother E ...
Jews from Galicia (Eastern Europe)
People from the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria
Ukrainian Jews
Jews from Austria-Hungary
People of the Haskalah