Santiago Ramón y Cajal/Full list of distinctions

This section lists the distinctions received by Santiago Ramón y Cajal over the course of his career (Cajal, 1989). A sample of his handwriting is also provided as a letter sent to the President of Clark University (Worcester, Massachusetts) to accept an invitation to give a series of lectures.

Distinctions received in Spain

• Member of the Royal Academy of Exact, Physical, and Natural Sciences of Madrid (Dec. 11, 1895).

• Member elect of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Madrid (Nov. 13, 1897).

• Member elect of the Royal Spanish Academy (June 22,1905).

• Member of the Spanish Natural History Society (President, 1896, and Honorary Member from 1898).

• Honorary Member of the Athenaeum of Madrid.

• Honorary Member of the Academy of Medicine and Surgery of Spain (April 18, 1897).

• Honorary Member of the College of Physicians of Madrid (Jan. 1, 1897).

• Counselor on Public Instruction (Royal Order of May 18,1900).

• Grand Cross of Isabel the Catholic (Royal Order of Oct. 29, 1900).

• Grand Cross of Alfonso XII (June 20, 1900).

• Honorary Member of the Royal Aragonese Society of Friends of the Country (Nov. 9, 1906).

• Honorary President of the Academy of Medical Sciences of Bilbao (Nov., 1906).

• Illustrious and Predilect Son of the Province of Zaragoza (Aug. 20, 1900).

• Corresponding Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences and Arts of Barcelona (Feb. 19, 1904).

• Honorary Member of the Spanish Physical and Chemical Society.

• Member of the Royal Academy of Medicine & Surgery of Madrid (June 30, 1907).

• Senator elected by the Central University (University of Madrid). Later Senator for life appointed by Royal Decree of Feb. 14, 1910.

• Counselor on Health, etc.

• Director of the National Institute of Hygiene of Alfonso XIII (1900).

• Honorary Director of the Alfonso XIII Institute (National Inst. of Hygiene) (1920).

• Honorary Professor of the University of Valladolid (Feb., 1922).

• Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Medicine and Surgery of Barcelona (May, 1922).

• Honorary President of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Cadiz (May, 1922).

• Honorary President of the Spanish Natural History Society (June 3, 1932).

• Medal Plus Ultra.

• Ribbon of the Order of the Republic (April, 1933).

Prizes and honorary awards at home and abroad

• Prize awarded by the Provincial Council of Zaragoza for the studies on the etiology of cholera (Sept. 17, 1885).

• Gold medal for exhibit of microscopic preparations at the World's Exposition at Barcelona (1888).

• Plaque presented by the Academy of Medicine and Pharmacy of Rome (1894).

• Medal presented by the International Congress of Hygiene (1897).

• Rubio Prize (1000 pesetas) for the publication of the book Elements of Histology (1897).

• Fauvelle Prize (1500 francs) awarded by the Société de Biologie of Paris (1896).

• Croonian Lecturer, Royal Society of London (March, 1894).

• Special Lecturer (with four illustrious foreign professors) at the Decennial Celebration of Clark University, Worcester, Mass.

• Moscow Prize (5000 francs) awarded by the executive committee of the International Medical Congress of Paris for the most important medical work published in the preceding three years (August, 1900).

• Martinez y Molina Prize (4000 pesetas) for a work, On the cerebral sensory centers of man and animals, written in collaboration with his brother, Dr. Pedro Ramon (Jan. 25, 1902).

• Helmholtz Gold Medal awarded by the Imperial Academy of Science of Berlin (1905).

• Plaque presented by the medical students of Madrid to commemorate the award of the Helmholtz Medal.

• Nobel Prize in Medicine for the year 1906.

• Gold medal presented by the medical students of Saragossa in memory of the Nobel Prize.

• Gold medal presented by the Spanish Lovers of Progress in commemoration of the Nobel Prize, etc.

• Commander of the Legion of Honor, Paris (1914).

• Cross of the Order "Pour Ie mérite" Berlin (1915).

• Echegaray Medal awarded by the Royal Academy of Sciences (April, 1922).

• Book in honor of Don Santiago Ramon y Cajal on the occasion of his retirement (2 vols., 1922).

• Member of the Order of the Crown of Romania (1933).

Partial list of foreign honorary degrees and titles

Figure 1: First (A), second (B), and third (C) pages of the undated letter from Cajal to the President of Clark University, G. Stanley Hall, where he accepts an invitation to visit the university (located in Worcester, Massachusetts), give a series of lectures and receive a honorary degree. (Clark University Archives, with permission.)

• Doctor of Medicine, honoris causa, University of Cambridge (March 14, 1894).

• Doctor of Medicine, honoris causa, University of Würzburg (Oct. 28, 1896).

• Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, Clark University (July 15, 1899). (His only trip to the U.S.A, see Haines, 2007)

• Doctor of Medicine, honoris causa, University of Louvain (May 10, 1909).

• Doctor of Medicine, honoris causa, University of Christiania (1911).

• Doctor, honoris causa, University of Mexico (Sept., 1922).

• Doctor, honoris causa, University of Bordeaux (Nov., 1922).

• Honorary title of Doctor of the University of Paris (Nov.29, 1924).

• Honorary Doctor of the University of Strasbourg (May, 1925).

• Honorary Doctor of Medicine of the University of Guatemala (May, 1925).

• Corresponding Member of the Medico-physical Society of Würzburg (Jan. 26, 1895).

• Corresponding Member of the Society of Medicine of Berlin (Sept. 25, 1895).

• Corresponding Member of the Society for Medical Sciences of Lisbon (July 11, 1896)~

• Corresponding Member of the Society for Neurology and Psychiatry of Vienna (June 3, 1896).

• Honorary Member of the Italian Psychiatric Society (Oct. 9, 1896).

• Corresponding Member of the Société de Biologie, Paris (Feb. 13, 1897).

• Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Lisbon (March 4, 1897).

• Honorary Academician of the Academia Scientiarum Ulisiponensis (March, 1897).

• Corresponding Member of the National Academy of Medicine, Rome (May, 1897).

• Corresponding Member of the Conimbricensis Instituti Societas, Coimbra (June, 1898).

• Honorary Member of the Society of Medicine of Ghent (Belgium) (April 3, 1900).

• Honorary Member of the Academy of Medicine of Budapest (Dec. 14, 1901).

• Honorary Member of the Society of Alienists and Neurologists of Kazan, Russia (April 9, 1902).

• Honorary Member of the Academy of Medicine of Yourief, University of Dorpat (Dec., 1902).

• Foreign Corresponding Member of the Academy of Medicine of Turin (May, 1903).

• Honorary Member of the Academy of Medicine of New York (Feb. 4, 1904).

• Honorary Member of the Imperial and Royal Academy of Medicine of Vienna (March 18, 1904).

• Foreign Associate of the Academy of Medicine of Paris (May 23, 1905).

• Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Rome (April, 1905).

• Honorary Member of the Medico-chirurgical Society of London (1905).

• Associate Member of the Société de Biologie of Paris (Dec. 16, 1905).

• Foreign Corresponding Member of the National Academy of Medicine of Venezuela (Jan. 4, 1906).

• Foreign Corresponding Member of the Société de Neurologie of Paris (Dec. 6, 1906).

• Corresponding Member of the Academy of Rome, Regia Lynceorum Academia (1906).

• Honorary Member of the Royal Irish Academy of Dublin (March 16, 1907).

• Foreign Correspondent of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Belgium (July 20, 1907).

• Honorary Academician of the Science Museum (Section of Biological Sciences) of the University of La Plata (Dec. 14, 1907).

• Fellow of the Royal Society of London (1909).

• Corresponding Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Turin (1910).

• Honorary Member of the Berliner Medizinische Gesellschaft (Oct. 26, 1910).

• Foreign Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Belgium (Jan. 20, 1911).

• Corresponding Member of the Italian Society of Neurology (1911).

• Foreign Member of the Royal Academy of Turin (1912).

• Honorary Member of the Royal Society of Medical and Natural Sciences of Brussels (1912).

• Foreign Associate of the Academy of Medicine of Paris (1913).

• Honorary Member of the Conimbricensis Instituti Societas, Coimbra (1913).

• Corresponding Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1913).

• Honorary Member of the Imperial University of St. Petersburg (July, 1914).

• Foreign Member of the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences (April, 1916).

• Corresponding Member of the Institute of France (1916).

• Honorary Academician of the Academy of Medicine of the National University of Buenos Aires (Aug. 14, 1919).

• Foreign Member of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (April, 1920).

• Member Extraordinary of the Royal Academy of Sciences of the Netherlands (May 19, 1920).

• Foreign Corresponding Associate of the Royal Lombard Institute of Science and Letters, Section of Medical Sciences (1921).

• Honorary Member of the Academy of Sciences of Santiago, Chile (1922).

• Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of Bavaria (July, 1922).

• Honorary Member of the National Academy of Medicine of Mexico (April, 1922).

• Honorary Member of the Mexican Society of Ophthalmology (May, 1922).

• Honorary Member of the Berlin Society of Psychiatry and Nervous Diseases (June, 1923).

• Honorary member of the Academy of Medicine of Bucharest (1923).

• Corresponding Member of the Florentine Medico-Physical Academy (May, 1924).

• Honorary Member of the American Neurological Association (June, 1924).

• Honorary Member of the Neurological Society of Philadelphia (Nov., 1924).

• External or Corresponding Member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (May, 1925).

• Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of Vienna (Math.-Naturw. Klasse) (May, 1926).

• Honorary Member of the Hispano-American Ophthalmological Society (Nov., 1931).

• Corresponding Member of the American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia (May, 1932).

• Foreign Corresponding Member of the British Medical Association (April, 1934).

References

• Cajal, SR. Recollections of my life. MIT Press:1989.

• <label>Haines07</label>Haines, D.E. (2007) Santiago Ramón y Cajal at Clark University, 1899; his only visit to the United States. Brain Res Rev, 55(2): 463-480

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