Ole Borch (latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

ized to Olaus Borrichius) was a Danish

Denmark

Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...

 scientist

Scientist

A scientist in a broad sense is one engaging in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge. In a more restricted sense, a scientist is an individual who uses the scientific method. The person may be an expert in one or more areas of science. This article focuses on the more restricted use of the word...

, physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

, grammarian, and poet, most famous today for being the teacher at the Vor Frue Skole in Copenhagen

Copenhagen

Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...

 of Nicholas Steno. Borch had studied medicine at the University of Copenhagen

University of Copenhagen

The University of Copenhagen is the oldest and largest university and research institution in Denmark. Founded in 1479, it has more than 37,000 students, the majority of whom are female , and more than 7,000 employees. The university has several campuses located in and around Copenhagen, with the...

 and distinguished himself in the plague

Bubonic plague

Plague is a deadly infectious disease that is caused by the enterobacteria Yersinia pestis, named after the French-Swiss bacteriologist Alexandre Yersin. Primarily carried by rodents and spread to humans via fleas, the disease is notorious throughout history, due to the unrivaled scale of death...

 of 1654, when a third of Copenhagen's population died. In 1655 he was patronized by Joachim Gersdorff

Joachim Gersdorff

Joachim Gersdorff was a Danish politician, from 1650 to 1660 Steward of the Danish Realm. It was Gersdorff who negotiated the Treaty of Roskilde on Denmark's part during the Second Northern War, a war he had himself been in favour of entering...

, the royal seneschal

Seneschal

A seneschal was an officer in the houses of important nobles in the Middle Ages. In the French administrative system of the Middle Ages, the sénéchal was also a royal officer in charge of justice and control of the administration in southern provinces, equivalent to the northern French bailli...

. In 1660 he became a professor philology

Philology

Philology is the study of language in written historical sources; it is a combination of literary studies, history and linguistics.Classical philology is the philology of Greek and Classical Latin...

 at the University of Copenhagen and in 1666 of chemistry

Chemistry

Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....

 and botany

Botany

Botany, plant science, or plant biology is a branch of biology that involves the scientific study of plant life. Traditionally, botany also included the study of fungi, algae and viruses...

.

Borch was a noted traveller with his three pupils, the sons of Gersdorff, between 1660-1665 he travelled to Holland, where he visited his former pupil Steno, Johann Glauber, Giuseppe Francesco Borri

Giuseppe Francesco Borri

Giuseppe Francesco Borri was an alchemist, prophet and doctor.- Education :In 1644, together with his brother, Borri entered a Jesuit seminary in Rome. There he was taught by the Jesuit scholar Athanasius Kircher, who had an important influence on him...

 and Comenius

Comenius

John Amos Comenius ; ; Latinized: Iohannes Amos Comenius) was a Czech teacher, educator, and writer. He served as the last bishop of Unity of the Brethren, and became a religious refugee and one of the earliest champions of universal education, a concept eventually set forth in his book Didactica...

. In England he met Robert Boyle

Robert Boyle

Robert Boyle FRS was a 17th century natural philosopher, chemist, physicist, and inventor, also noted for his writings in theology. He has been variously described as English, Irish, or Anglo-Irish, his father having come to Ireland from England during the time of the English plantations of...

 and in France he visited Melchisédech Thévenot

Melchisédech Thévenot

Melchisédech Thévenot was a French author, scientist, traveler, cartographer, orientalist, inventor, and diplomat...

. His well recorded journals of his travels are an important document of the European scientific climate in the 17th century.

Borch is one of the fathers of experimental science in Denmark. It was Borch who first introduced Steno to fossils such as glossopetrae which Borch used, as was common for the time, in medicines. He is the founder of Collegium Mediceum/Borchs Kollegium

Borchs Kollegium

Borchs Kollegium was founded on 29 May 1691 to house sixteen poor, God-fearing and learned students...

 in central Copenhagen. He extracted oxygen

Oxygen

Oxygen is the element with atomic number 8 and represented by the symbol O. Its name derives from the Greek roots ὀξύς and -γενής , because at the time of naming, it was mistakenly thought that all acids required oxygen in their composition...

 out of saltpeter

Potassium nitrate

Potassium nitrate is a chemical compound with the formula KNO3. It is an ionic salt of potassium ions K+ and nitrate ions NO3−.It occurs as a mineral niter and is a natural solid source of nitrogen. Its common names include saltpetre , from medieval Latin sal petræ: "stone salt" or possibly "Salt...

in 1678.

Works

• De Ortu et Progressu Chemiae Dissertatio, 1668;
• Hermetis, Aegypiorum et Chemicorum sapientia, 1674;
• Conspectus Scriptorum Chemicorum Celebriorum, 1696 (posthumously).