The Semmelweis Museum, Library and Archive of the History of Medicine () is a museum, library and archive in Budapest, Hungary. It was founded in 1965, and became a department of the Hungarian National Museum in 2017. The museum is located in the 18th-century house where Ignaz Semmelweis was born in 1818. The exhibition covers the development of healthcare in Hungary and the main stages in the history of medicine in Europe.

Meindl House Meindl House is an 18th-century building at the foot of Várhegy (Castle Hill) in the Tabán neighbourhood, near the Danube river (the present address is no. 1-3 Apród utca). The house is a listed national monument due to its architectural significance and being the birthplace of Ignaz Semmelweis, an early pioneer of antiseptic procedures. Described as the "saviour of mothers", Semmelweis discovered that the incidence of childbed fever could be drastically reduced by requiring hand disinfection in obstetrical clinics.Semmelweis Ignác élettörténete/ (Semmelweis Egyetem)

Ignaz Semmelweis was born in the house on 1 July 1818; he was the fifth child of Joseph Semmelweis and Theresia Müller. The Semmelweis family were ethnic Germans, his father was born in Kismarton near the Austrian border, and his mother was the daughter of a coachbuilder from Buda.József Antall, Géza Szebellédy: Aus den Jahrhunderten der Heilkunde, Budapest: Corvina Verlag, 1973, pp. 7–8 Joseph Semmelweis was granted citizenship in Buda in 1806 and, in the same year, he opened a wholesale business for spices and general consumer goods. The shop was named Zum weißen Elefanten (At the White Elephant), and it was located on the ground floor of Meindl House (to the right of the entrance).Hermann Baum: Ignaz Semmelweis. Seine Vorfahren väterlicherseits und mütterlicherseits, Norderstedt, 2018, p. 11 Joseph Semmelweis lived in a flat on the first floor with his growing family. There was a cafe on the ground floor (on the left side) that belonged to the owner of the house, Johann Meindl. In 1823 Joseph Semmelweis relocated his grocery shop to the other side of the street into a house that he bought a year before.József Antall: Semmelweis Ignác tabáni szülőháza és utolsó pesti lakhelye, Műemlékvédelem 10 (1966) No. 3., pp. 172-180 The Semmelweis family also moved into this house before 1830; Ignaz Semmelweis left Buda in 1837 when he went to study at the university in Vienna.Katalin Simon: Semmelweis Ignác és családja 1. – Fiatalkor Budán, Levéltári Mozaikok, 2023/14

Meindl House was constructed around 1790 but it was rebuilt in Late Baroque (Zopf) style after the Great Tabán Fire of 1810. At the time its location near the Pest-Buda Floating Bridge was prominent. The bridge connected the two cities, and the square on the Buda side was an important crossroads from where streets led to the north, south and up to Buda Castle. The latter was called Várfeljárat (Festungsauffahrt, now Apród utca), and the house was built facing this road on the corner of a flight of steep steps (now called Sándor Móric lépcső). After the Chain Bridge was opened in 1849 the area lost its role as a trade and traffic hub.Edit Szentesi: A tabáni Szarvas-ház, Tanulmányok Budapest Múltjából 34. (2009), p. 67

Architecturally the most interesting feature of the facade is the cornice, onetime regarded as the most beautiful in Buda; it has a twin corbels and exquisite hanging stucco garlands.Albert Petrik: A régi Buda-Pest épitőművészete, Vol. 3., Ifj. Nagel Ottó Könyvkeresk. 1911, p. 32 Due to the steep slope of Castle Hill, the narrow rear wing of the house was built upon a stone retaining wall with four cellars dug into the ground. There were hanging corridors on three sides of the courtyard on the upper floor while the northern wing had a spacious terrace. Behind the main house there was an upper courtyard with smaller ancillary structures that were demolished in the late 1890s when the headquarters of the Directorate of Royal Gardens was built on the subdivided plot (the large building was destroyed in the war).Gábor László Fecske: Eltűnt épületek nyomában (61.) – A Királyi Várkertészet igazgatósági épülete, Vasárnap, 2022. 10. 26.

The house remained in possession of Johann Meindl until 1844. Later its owners were Lőrinc Jankovits (between 1844 and 1852) and Leo Schallinger (from 1852). Schallinger's heirs sold the house in 1885 to a wealthy grocer, Márton Wolf who remained its owner until his death during the final years of World War I. There were shops and pubs on the ground floor, among them the most famous clockmaker's shop in Budapest which was established by Victor Hoser and carried on by his son.Noémi Saly: Régi idők, régi órások, Budapest, 2011, no. 4, p. 31 The shop operated here from 1880 until 1935 when it relocated to nearby Attila körút. Another longstanding business was Mór Fried's shoemaker's shop. Herculanum mulató was a popular café chantant (zengeráj, Sängerei) in the 1880s, frequented by Crown Prince Rudolf and his friends according to local legends, and it had a beer garden in the interior courtyard.Eltűnik az egykori budai "zengeráj" háza, in: Budai Napló, 1938 June 23, p. 3; and Béla Bevilacqua Borsody: Pest-budai kávéházak, Budapesti Kávésok Ipartestülete, 1935, Vol. I, p. 205

In 1906 commemorations were held in Budapest to celebrate the achievements of Ignaz Semmelweis. The events were organised by the Budapesti Királyi Orvosegyesület (Budapest Royal Society of Physicians), and a red granite plaque was unveiled at his boyhood home in Apród utca.Semmelweis emlékezete, in: Magyarország, 1906 October 2

Around 1918 the house was bought by Gyula Kalmár, the owner of a liquor factory, who wanted to demolish it in 1936 but his application for a six-storey apartment building was denied by the municipality.Fővárosi Közlöny, 1936 no. 23., p. 730 Two years later the municipality bought the house for 152'000 pengő with the intention to raze it as part of the ongoing urban renewal project of the Tabán area.Fővárosi Közlöny, 1938 no. 33., p. 858

By that time the old house has fallen into a state of disrepair, and its occupants were extremely poor.Orvosi Hetilap, 1939 no. 29., p. 702 The building was vacated in 1939 but two years later it was inhabited again by destitute families who lived there in unhealthy conditions. The fate of the house remained uncertain for years because some argued that it should be restored due to its historical connection with Semmelweis while others claimed that it has deteriorated beyond repair.Semmelweis szülőházát elporlasztja az idő..., Uj Magyarság, 1941 June 11, p. 4 Although remaining a crowded slum, it was finally listed as a protected monument in 1942 by ministerial decree.Magyar Jövő, 1942 no. 219., p. 10 The municipality intended to create a museum and a kindergarten in the building after the war.Csak a háború után szűnnek meg a szükséglakások Semmelweis szülőházában, Ujság, 1944 no. 23., p. 7

The surrounding area was almost completely destroyed in 1945 during the Siege of Budapest, and the ruins were cleared in the following years. Meindl House was an exception: although the northern and rear wings were lost (including the former flat of the Semmelweis family), the surviving part was hastily repaired after the war to make it habitable again. The plaque above the gate also survived the war but disappeared a few years later in unknown circumstances.Péter Molnár: A Krisztinaváros történelmi emlékei, in: Esti Budapest, 1952 October 21., p. 4 Seven families lived in the remaining half of the house in 1959 without running water, also there was a car repair shop in the courtyard and a heap of overgrown rubble where the destroyed wing had stood.Kocsis Tamás: Mentsük meg a Semmwelweis-házat!, in: Magyar Nemzet, 1959 September 10, p. 3.

Medical history museum

The dilapidated building was still bearing the scars of the war in 1958 when the Ministry of Health decided the creation of a museum of medical history in the birthplace of Hungary's most famous doctor.Orvostörténeti múzeum lesz Semmelweis Ignác szülőháza, in: Népszava, 1958 July 29, p. 4. The tenants were moved out in 1962, and the much delayed reconstruction of the house finally began. A number of artefacts and memorabilia in the Library of Medical History (Orvostörténeti Könyvtár) and the university became the nucleus of the collection but a nationwide campaign was started as well to gather more relevant objects. The museum was officially established on 13 August 1965, the 100th anniversary of Semmelweis' death.Művelődésügyi Közlöny, 1965/20, p. 335

Meindl House was reconstructed by the Budapesti Városépítési Tervező Vállalat (BVTV) according to the plans of Egon Pfannl. The exterior was carefully restored and the missing half of the building was rebuilt. The shopfronts and the doors on the ground floor were replaced by windows, and a metal framed glass door was installed to allow passers-by a glimpse into the vaulted gateway and the courtyard. The Late Baroque facade was painted red and white. The new north and west wings flanking the courtyard were built in mid-century modern style with rough-hewn stone walls on the ground floor and large ribbon windows on the upper story. The surviving parts of the house with the staircase, the hanging corridors around the courtyard and a few vaulted rooms were restored. The ground-floor spaces were converted to offices, library, council room and other auxiliary uses while the upper floor housed the exhibition with the Ignaz Semmelweis Memorial Room at the northwest corner, and the relocated interior of the Török Pharmacy in a neighbouring room.Anna Kaiser: A Semmelweis-ház helyreállítása, in: Magyar Építőművészet, 1966 no. 4, pp. 40-43 The modern exhibition spaces were designed by István Németh who worked on the new interiors of Buda Castle at the time.Emőke Gréczi: Múzeumi beruházások a hatvanas években Budapesten, in: MúzeumCafé, 2021, no. 85., p. 240

The remains of Ignaz Semmelweis were moved from the Kerepesi Cemetery to the museum in 1963, and reinterred in a niche of the retaining wall on the western side of the courtyard. This tomb became the fifth burial place of the famous doctor. Motherhood, a bronze sculpture by Miklós Borsos was unveiled in front of it on 13 August 1965.Megkezdődött a Semmelweis-emlékülés, Magyar Nemzet, 1965 no. 191., p. 3

The first director of the museum was a distinguished gynecologist and medical historian, Sándor Fekete, the biographer of Ignaz Semmelweis. He was appointed in 1964, and served as director until his retirement in 1971.Károly Kapronczay: Fekete Sándor (1885-1972), in: Orvosi Hetilap, 1985, no. 46., p. 2850 The next director was internist Emil Schultheisz (from 1972 to 1973) who was also deputy minister of health at the time. The Library of Medical History was merged into the museum in 1968, and the combined institution became a museum of national significance in 1972. The first permanent exhibition was opened in 1968 titled "Pictures from the History of Medicine" (Képek a gyógyítás múltjából). The rearranged and expanded exhibition was reopened on 21 May 1974 by Emil Schultheisz who was Minister of Health at the time.Géza Buzinkay: A Semmelweis Orvostörténeti Múzeum újjárendezett állandó kiállítása, in: Orvosi Hetilap, 1974, no. 36., p. 2144 An independent exhibition on pharmaceutical history was created in 1974 in the old Arany Sas Pharmacy in Buda Castle. The permanent exhibition of the museum remained unchanged for a long time, and its basic arrangement is still the same (as of 2022).