Sigismund Freud was born May 6, 1856, in Freiberg, Moravia to parents Jacob and Amalia. He changed his name to Sigmund in 1878. The Freud family moved to Vienna, Austria in 1860. Freud was an excellent student and graduated from secondary school in 1873, after which he began studying medicine at the University of Vienna. He receives his doctorate degree in 1881. Freud was very much interested in the unconscious of the mind, hysteria and hypnosis so he studied it intensely with Jean-Martin Charcoat (a well-known neurologist at the time). Freud found hypnosis so effective that he used it on his patients once he opened his own practice in 1886. This method of his soon became known as psychoanalysis and became a very popular method of treatment. Some of his patients even referred to it as “the talking cure” since it involved a lot of free talk about memories and experiences from very early childhood.
He married Martha Bernays in 1886. The couple had six children: Mathilde, Jean-Martin, Oliver, Ernst, Sophie and Anna. Anna would follow his footsteps later on in life.
As a medical researcher, Freud was an early user and supporter of cocaine as he believed that it was a cure for many mental and physical problems, and in his 1884 paper "On Coca" he praised its virtues.
Strangely, all his interest and further studies of psychoanalysis came in a period where he experienced a lot of health issues (heart problems, depression, disturbing dreams). He linked all of these problems with the loss of his father in 1896. That provoked him to do a lot of self analysis and exploration of the root of the problems.
In 1893 he began formulating his seduction theory which claimed that neurosis had roots in unconscious memories of sexual molestation in early childhood. He published many works; some of the more important ones are “Studies on Hysteria” (1895) and “Interpretation of Dreams” (1900)
Freud began correspondence with Carl Jung in 1906 when Jung was