JOHANN KONRAD AMMAN. — Swiss physician, b. at Schaffhausen in 1669, d. at Warmond in 1724. He practiced medicine in Holland, where, while treating a deaf-mute girl, he resolved to instruct her. Having achieved excellent results, he wished to continue in the art of instructing the deaf-mute and in 1692 published *Surdus loquens*, in which he discussed the method he had followed. The work was published in Latin at Amsterdam and in German at Haarlem; in 1700 it was republished under the new title *Dissertatio de loquela* (first Italian version by Vittorio Banchi, Siena, 1901).
The method proposed by the author is the oral method, which others had also recommended before him. Yet he was the first to establish the oral method of instructing the deaf-mute on a secure scientific foundation. His work enjoyed wide circulation, bringing decisive progress to oral instruction for the deaf-mute. Alongside a secure scientific basis, the author clearly and precisely sets forth the practical procedure for teaching articulated speech to the congenitally deaf, as the sole means for their participation in social life, from which they would otherwise be inexorably excluded by their infirmity.