Countess Gabriebele von Wartensleben | |
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 at the age of 18 years | |
| Born | Gabriele Freiin von Andrian-Werburg |
Gabriele von Wartensleben (24 April 1870 – 12 August 1953) was aGermanpsychologist who published the first academic statement onGestalt theory. She additionally was the first woman to receive aPhD in psychology fromUniversity of Vienna through anhonorary degree.[1]
Gabriele von Wartensleben was born in the Bavarian town ofAnsbach on 24 April 1870. Her family was educated: her fatherFerdinand Freiherr von Andrian-Werburg worked with anthropology and ethnography; her mother Cäcilie was the daughter ofopera composerGiacomo Meyerbeer; her brotherLeopold Andrian (1875-1951) became anAustriandiplomat,author anddramatist.[2]
Her marriage to Dr. Konrad Graf Wartensleben resulted in a son, who died at the age of twenty years. The couple was divorced in Berlin after five years in 1895.[2]
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In 1895, Gabriele von Wartensleben graduated from theUniversity of Zurich, studiedclassical philology and classical archeology. Her doctoral thesis on the concept of the Greekchreia and contributions to the history of its form was submitted to theUniversity of Vienna, where, on 3 May 1900, she became the first female doctoral student to receive her doctorate (without having ever studied there).[2]
In 1913, while studying at the Frankfurt Academy for Social Sciences, she was in the spheres ofMax Wertheimer andWolfgang Köhler, two of the founders of Gestalt theory, even recruiting them for her own psychology experiments. In that same year, she graduated from the Frankfurt Academy with a doctorate and began teaching.[3]
In 1914, she wrote and published a long footnote inThe Christian personality in the ideal image which is the first published reference toGestalt theory.[3]
By the mid-1920s, Gabriele was teaching around Germany before moving to theprincipality ofLiechtenstein for eight years. From 1933 until her death in 1953 she lived in the Swiss city of Basel and continued her career as an author and teacher.[2] She was buried at the cemetery ofSchaan, Liechtenstein, in the tomb of German biologistMaria von Linden (1869-1936), who was the first woman in Germany to receive the title of a professor and with whom she had a lifelong friendship.[4]
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