First classification of fingerprint patterns (Purkinje)
Primera clasificación de las huellas dactilares (Purkinje)
- Date
- 1823 · confidence high
- Place
- Breslau (Wrocław), Lower Silesia, Poland
- Credited to
- Jan Evangelista Purkyně
- Field
- Life & health
What was discovered
In his professorial thesis the Czech physiologist described nine types of finger ridge patterns and classified them by name. He did not propose using them to identify people but treated them as an anatomical trait.
The thesis was published in Latin in Breslau. Purkyně was then a professor at the University of Breslau (Prussia), today Wrocław; he is not regarded as the inventor of fingerprint identification.
What it led to
- a morphological classification of dermal ridges
- the anatomical basis of the fingerprinting later developed by Galton and Vucetich