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1. There are many streets of J. Basanavičiaus in Lithuania. And not only in Lithuania
There are 103 settlements in Lithuania with city status. Even 41 of them have J.Basanavičiaus streets. There are only 7 personalities in Lithuania, and more streets in the city are named after him: Vytautas, Žemaitė, Darius and Girėnas, Birutė, Kęstutis and Salomėja Nėris.
Postcard from the Row Printing Department of the Wrublewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, Editorial D. Vizūnas. Basanavičiaus Street, 1907
Also, two more J. Basanavičiaus streets can be found in cities outside Lithuania: Bulgaria. Those cities are Varna and Lomas. In both cities, J. Basanavičius worked as a doctor.
2. J.Basanavičius was not an ordinary doctor in Bulgaria
When we say “he worked as a doctor,” we don’t just mean that he practiced medicine. That alone might not have been enough for even two Bulgarian cities to name their streets, but Basanavičius has also done a lot for public health.
Photo from 123rf.com/Varna, Bulgaria
The local population of Lomé, where the Lithuanian worked in 1880-1882. and from 1885 to 1892 he avoided doctors and especially hospitals. There was a general belief that one only goes to the hospital to die. But J.Basanavičius was able to persuade the people of Lomoma to treat him.
He was also actively involved in the prevention of diseases: he took care of the dissemination of vaccines in the country, he fought against syphilis, making the treatment of syphilis patients free and accessible to all.
J.Basanavičius was also asked by the local government. Authorities in Varna, now a popular tourist center, approached him with questions about how to improve the health and epidemiological situation in the city.
The doctor found solutions: he advised the authorities to drain the lake and swamp near Varna, from where malaria mosquitoes spread, to plant trees to protect the city from sand and dust at rest. He also advised charging incoming tourists. After the implementation of J.Basanavičius’s proposals, the health situation in Bulgaria has improved significantly.
The fact that J.Basanavičius was an exceptional doctor is demonstrated by the reaction of the local population of Lomo to the decision to transfer him to work in Varna: they collected signatures and sent them to the authorities, asking the doctor to go to work in Lome.
3. J.Basanavičius was shot, but it is unclear why
In Lomé, J. Basanavičius was active in political and social life, and in 1887, the locals also seem to have posed a threat. an attempt was made to kill a Lithuanian. Two shots only wounded the doctor, but one bullet caught near the spine and the doctor reported it for the rest of his life.
Photo from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs / A commemorative plaque was unveiled at the home of J. Basanavičius in Bulgaria
The circumstances of the attack are unclear. J.Basanavičius, who already lives in Lithuania, wrote: “One night, a local resident, a melancholic and a little crazy man Manoilov came to invite me with his supposedly ill sister. On the way, he stayed a little behind and fired a revolver: kulipka hurt my left arm, breaking his elbow; the appendages hit the shoulders with another shot; He fired a third time, but I missed the race. The motive for this murder remained a mystery: it is believed to have been a hateful attack against a foreigner. “
However, in court, as historian Algirdas Grigaravičius writes, J.Basanavičius refused to give any testimony or explanation about the attack. Not only that, he asked the aggressor to justify himself.
4. J.Basanavičius had a nervous disease
J.Basanavičius himself struggled with medical problems. He suffered from a nervous illness for much of his life. The importance it has for J. Basanavičius is demonstrated by the fact that he even called his autobiography “The chronicle of my life and the history of nervous diseases 1851-1922”.
Photo by Renatas Neverbickas and National Museum of Lithuania. (15min edit) / Act February 16 and Jonas Basanavičius
J. Basanavičius linked his illness to a bullet, which remained in the body after the aforementioned attack.
“This kulipka, along with other disasters mentioned before, resulted in severe neurasthenia, which, as we will see below, lasted for many years and now bothers me. This kulipka, along with other disasters mentioned before, resulted in severe neurasthenia, which, as we will see later, lasted for many years and still haunts me now. And the fact that this soil has been partially prepared for neurasthenia from birth, as it was born to a hysterical mother and a dry father, can be proved by other facts that there was already a certain predisposition in my nervous system “, – in the autobiography (language not corrected – 15min) wrote J.Basanavičius.
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