Women in Science

Habilitation | Professuren | Funktionen

At the same time as the first female students enrolled at the philosophical faculty of the University of Vienna in 1897, the first woman also received a doctorate for medicine. Gabriele Possanner von Ehrenthal had already studied in Zurich and Geneva and obtained her doctorate in 1894. Although women were not yet permitted to study medicine in Vienna, she was allowed to repeat the exams for her doctoral viva (Rigorosum). She became the first female doctor in the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. Although these were the first important steps towards the institution of the university, women still had a long way to go in securing their place in academia.