Sigmund Freud (1856–1939), one of the most influential figures of the 20^th century, a brilliant mind who shocked mankind with his controversial ideas, but left an indelible mark on our culture and opened the gates to the unexplored chambers of the human psyche. The Austrian doctor and psychologist changed the way we think about ourselves... His psychoanalytical terms, such as id, ego, libido, neuroses, and the Oedipus complex have become a part of our everyday vocabulary. He is the founder of psychoanalysis – the theory of personality that highlights the influence of subconscious behavioral determinants, sexual and aggressive urges, and the permanent effects of early childhood experience on later personality development. It is hard to imagine just how radical Freud himself and his theory appeared to his contemporaries because his ideas seem provocative to us even today, and his heritage has had a continuous impact on psychology, literature, philosophy, and art.

Sigmund Freud was born on May 6, 1856 as Sigismund Schlomo Freud, the firstborn child of Jakob and Amalia Freud. He was born in a province of Austria-Hungary (Pribor in the present-day Czech Republic). Freud lived in Vienna for most of his life until he was forced to go to London, where he died aged 83. He was his mother’s favorite. He had his own room and an oil lamp while the other children in the family had to use candles when studying.

He was a descendant of an old Jewish family and faced covert or open antisemitism early on and continued to do so during his studies, and later in his career. Not much is known about his youth because he destroyed any documents that could provide more information on the subject on two occasions. Documents from later on were carefully kept in Freud’s archive which was available only to his personal biographer Ernest Jones and to several psychoanalysts closest to him.

He finished studying medicine in 1881 and started his work on the anatomy and physiology of the central nervous system. In 1885, he became an assistant professor of neuropathy and received a scholarship for professional training with the famous Charcot at the Salpêtrière hospital in Paris. Meanwhile in 1884, he was testing the effects of cocaine, which was a little known alkaloid at the time, for the Merck Company. He left the verification of this research to others (first for eye therapy and later for local anesthesia in minor surgical interventions). Although he somewhat regretted abandoning his research of cocaine, Freud was, in his own words, never interested in neurology. He was interested in psychopathology, especially neurosis (hysteria), and at the time, the Salpêtrière hospital was the source of the latest findings in that scientific area. Even before this, while practicing neuropathology, Freud believed that the majority of mental disorders he had come into contact with, especially neuroses, did not have an organic but a psychological origin, which was in contrast to many Viennese doctors who believed them to be organic disorders. In particular, Freud highlighted Charcot’s daringness to use his authority in representing viewpoints that were in stark contrast to the dominant viewpoints of contemporary academic psychopathology. At the peak of his fame, Freud wrote that he never forgot some of Charcot’s statements, observing how he himself faced heavy accusations due to the very same statements, whereas Charcot faced no accusations from the public. Upon his return to Vienna in 1886, Freud, now a medical specialist for neurological diseases, held a single lecture in front of the Viennese medical society about what he had seen and learned from Charcot. He also opened a private practice. He was almost completely ignored. An older doctor accused him of saying absurd things because the term hustéra means womb in Greek, so it makes no sense to speak about the hysteria of males. The way the Viennese medical society received his new views on neuroses hinted at the later difficulties that Freud would have in the development of psychoanalysis.

In 1886, he married Martha Bernays and dedicated himself to his private practice as a neurologist. Sigmund and Martha had six children, three sons and three daughters. Anna Freud, one of his daughters, would later become a renowned psychoanalytical theoretician in the area of child psychology. Although their characters were different, the love between Sigmund and Martha was strong. Martha dedicated herself to raising six children while Freud worked on his cases day and night. Martha was a passionate woman, she claimed that love must either be extreme or there should be no love at all. On the other hand, Freud was jealous and restrictive, convinced that women were limited by their sex. Still, Martha was by his side when he needed her the most. Allegedly, she saved her husband from a possible cocaine addiction he had developed while experimenting, not knowing that cocaine can cause addiction.

Freud was one of the greatest defenders and supporters of the medicinal use of cocaine, but he was also a consumer.

Namely, cocaine was regarded as the latest miracle medicine 130 years ago. It was believed that it could cure anything, from morphine addiction, depression, anxiety, lethargy, and fatigue to stomach ailments, asthma, and tuberculosis.

Freud began studying the effects of this drug as early as 1884 and in his clinical notes he clearly stated that he preferred experimenting on himself. As he suffered from arrhythmia and respiratory blockages, this was enough of an excuse for him to consume vast amounts of the drug.

Still, Freud was not the first to write about cocaine. Up until 1880, numerous pharmaceutical companies produced a cocaine-hydrochloride concentrate, and many doctors reported on the effects the new “cure” had on their patients.

Substituting one drug for another was the usual way of treating addiction in the 19^th century. These types of medicinal games were often performed, and experiments on “new addicts” were always welcome.

Freud also tested cocaine on his best friend, Ernst von Fleischl-Marxow, a morphine addict. Marxow was an excellent psychologist. However, he had hurt himself while performing an autopsy and developed chronic pains which in turn drove him to morphine addiction.

Freud turned his close friend into a guinea pig and a cocaine addict, and thanks to the efforts to “help” him, Fleischl-Marxow died seven years later, aged 45.

Not only did Freud fail to learn anything from this unfortunate event and abandon the idea of cocaine, but he continued to glorify and consume it even more than before in order to relieve any physical pain and mental problems. When he was under the effects of cocaine, he liked to talk endlessly about the experiences and memories he considered to be locked in his subconscious.

The turning point in Freud’s career and the development of psychoanalysis was his cooperation with Josef Breuer.

Breuer used hypnosis as a treatment technique, which Freud adopted and soon developed his own free association technique in order to help his patients discover their forgotten memories. They would spontaneously state their uncensored thoughts and feelings. The thread that leads to the crucial, long forgotten memories would be discovered from these free associations.

Breuer and Freud published Studies on Hysteria in which they described studies of their cases, a book that marked a turning point. Its publication in 1895 marked the advent of psychoanalysis.

In 1900, Freud published The Interpretation of Dreams, which was also his first independent work in which he announced his psychoanalytical teachings. He believed that dreams symbolically reflect unconscious desires.

In 1904, Freud published a book which would become his most popular work – The Psychopathology of Everyday Life in which he described how unconscious feelings and desires are often reflected through slips of the tongue. As the theory grew stronger and gained more ground, Freud acquired new supporters and followers. With his followers he founded the International Psychoanalytical Association. During the next thirty years, Freud published numerous books, articles and lectures.

In 1897, Freud was nominated for a professorial position at the University of Vienna, but the nomination was turned down by the Ministry of Education. Freud continued his private psychotherapeutic practice and became increasingly renowned in Viennese professional and lay circles. His clientele consisted of more educated and wealthier individuals.

Although he enjoyed complete professional satisfaction, the last two decades of his life were filled with numerous tragedies. The terrible devastation of the First World War took a heavy toll on him, especially due to the fact he had two sons in the army. One of Freud’s daughters died from flu in 1920, at the age of 26. At the beginning of the 1920s, he developed jaw cancer, for which he had to undergo more than thirty operations.

Freud’s harsh pessimism, which he displayed in his book Civilization and its Discontents (1930), was a reflection of the destruction he saw all around him. In May of 1933, Freud’s books were burned among many others in Berlin when Adolf Hitler took power in Germany. Five years later, the Nazis took control over Austria. Although his life was in danger, it was only after his youngest daughter Anna had been taken in by the Gestapo for questioning that Freud agreed to leave Vienna with a heavy heart. Four of Freud’s sisters would later die in Nazi concentration camps.

After the Nazis, who had staged public burnings of Freud’s books in Berlin, occupied Austria in 1938, Sigmund moved to England with his family. Less than a year later, on September 23, 1939, he died in London at the age of 83 due to jaw cancer.

Id – a completely unconscious and irrational component of the personality which requires immediate satisfaction of urges and desires, governed by the pleasure principle.

Ego – partially conscious, the ego represents the organized, rational dimension of a personality that plans. As the mediator between the id’s urges and the limitations of the outside world, the ego functions according to the reality principle.

Superego – as the inner representation of parental and social values, the superego evaluates the acceptability of certain behaviors and thoughts and approves or condemns them. Simply put, your superego represents your conscience.

Oedipus complex – in Freud’s theory this is the child’s unconscious sexual desire towards the parent of the opposite sex, accompanied by hostile feelings towards the parent of the same sex.

Libido – in Freud’s theory this is the psychological and emotional energy associated with displaying sexuality, i.e. with sexual urges.

Freudianism is a general term used to describe the influence of Freud’s ideas and psychoanalysis on various areas of science and art, especially in anthropology, psychology, psychiatry, sociology, mental hygiene, social work, literature and upbringing. According to research in various areas of science, culture, and civilization in general, Freud’s contribution undoubtedly ranks among the top scientific discoveries, especially within social and humanistic sciences.