you can’t say to anyone to their face: your paper is...

Ann. Phys. (Berlin) 17, No. 5, 273 – 301 (2008) / DOI 10.1002/andp.200810294

Historical Review

“… you can’t say to anyone to their face: your paper is rubbish.”

Max Planck as Editor of the Annalen der Physik

Dieter Hoffmann∗

Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Boltzmannstr. 22, 14195 Berlin, Germany

Received 23 January 2008Published online 23 April 2008

Key words Max Planck, Wilhelm Wien, Annalen der Physik, edition of scientific journals, modern physics,German Physical Society.PACS 01.65.+g

In honour of Max Planck (1858–1947) on the occasion of his 150th birthday

Max Planck’s place in the history of the Annalen der Physik, which spans some two hundred years, can becharacterized as unique. Planck not only published the majority of his own scientific papers in this periodicalbut was also connected to it personally in various editorial positions. Thus for over half a century, from 1894until 1947, he contributed decisively toward its promotion as a leading international professional journalof modern physics. This paper documents Planck’s diverse relationships with the Annalen der Physik andanalyzes his editorship against the backdrop of the evolving physics in the first quarter of the 20th century.

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1 Annalen der Physik

In the summer of 1790 Carl Gren, professor of physics, chemistry and pharmacology at the Universityof Halle, founded the “Journal der Physik”. From 1795 it appeared under the name Neues Journal derPhysik and finally, after Gren’s death in 1798, as the Annalen der Physik. It numbered among the firstprofessional journals in science, nevertheless it lacked the international aura and repute enjoyed by suchsister periodicals as the Annales de Chimie et Physique (founded 1789) or the Philosophical Magazine(founded 1798) originating at just about the same time. Germany was still a developing nation in the field ofthe natural and technical sciences, which were being defined and developed by the discoveries and inventionsof British and French scientists and engineers. The intellectual metropolises of the world were Paris andLondon; and the language of physics and the sciences in general at the turn of the 18th to the 19th centurieswas French. English dominated in the areas of technology and engineering. The task Gren’s Journal took on,and that its successor editors William Gilbert (1799–1824) and Johann Christian Poggendorff (1824–1877)continued to pursue, was to convey to the German scientific community the latest scientific findings bymeans of translations of original papers or reviews. Original papers by German authors were also accepted,of course, not least as reprints from series issued by the important academies, which had hitherto – beforethe founding of the first professional journals at the close of the 18th century – provided and vouched forthe transmission of research results. Book reviews and notices rounded off the picture.

∗ E-mail: [email protected]

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274 D. Hoffmann: Max Planck as Editor of the Annalen der Physik

Fig. 1 Max Planck as student, 1878.© Archive of the MPG Berlin.

A century later the situation had changed fundamentally. Germany was vying with Britain and France notonly politically for power in Europe and took the lead in many fields of science and technology. In physicsin particular, considerable progress was made during the final third of the 19th century by German orGerman-speaking scholars including Ludwig Boltzmann, Hermann von Helmholtz, Friedrich Kohlrauschand Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen. The Annalen der Physik (und Chemie), under the editorship of GustavWiedemann since the death of Poggendorff in 1878, became the leading professional journal in physics inthis time. Original papers now made up the majority of its articles and their topics were increasingly at theforefront of physical research of the day [1,2]. These changes are also mirrored in Max Planck’s life storyand his editorship of the Annalen.

2 Max Planck’s biography [3]

Planck was born on April 23, 1858 in Kiel. His father Johann Julius Wilhelm had been working at the localuniversity as professor of law since 1850. In 1867 he was appointed to the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitätin Munich. So the young Planck mainly grew up in the Bavarian metropolis. He also gained most of hisearly intellectual impressions from there, although his family tradition had a strong Prussian streak. In 1874he had just turned 16 when he passed his school leaving examinations and took up studies in physics atthe University of Munich. In 1877 he left for Berlin for two semesters. Since Bismarck’s unification of the

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Ann. Phys. (Berlin) 17, No. 5 (2008) 275

Reich, the city was not just the capital of the German empire but was gaining increasing fame at homeand abroad as a centre for science and culture. The University of Berlin advanced to the top institution ofinstruction and research. With the appointment of Hermann Helmholtz and Gustav Kirchhoff in the field ofphysics, an epoch began in which “the general history of physics became most intimately linked with thehistory of Berlin physics.” [4]

Although the lectures by these two famous physicists were rather a disappointment for Planck, the highlevel at which science was being cultivated by them and in Berlin general would have a lasting influence onthe course his life was to take. But first he took his doctorate in the spring of 1879 at the University of Munich,defending a thesis on the second law of heat theory. He earned his Habilitation degree already in the followingyear analyzing the equilibrium states of isotropic bodies at different temperatures [5]. This work becamePlanck’s future focus of research: thermodynamics, or more specifically, the 2nd law of thermodynamicsand the concept of entropy [6]. In the years that followed he systematically examined the consequences ofthe 2nd law and the significance of the concept of entropy for thermodynamic equilibria in physico-chemicalsystems. His related publications from the 1880s treated, among other things, the thermodynamic theory ofmelting, evaporation and sublimation, the determination of the function of entropy for numerous systems inphysical chemistry as well as the thermodynamic explanation of thermal phenomena. The most importantand discerning findings of this early period concerned the theory of dilute solutions. Planck was able tospecify the laws governing a drop in freezing point and a rise in boiling point and determine the chemicalequilibrium in such solutions. Throughout his life Planck never entirely left the field of thermodynamics.In 1920 he succeeded in finding the ultimate thermodynamic formulation for Nernst’s heat theorem and in1934 he gave the Braun-Le Chatelier principle – the principle of least resistance – its final form. Anotherachievement deserving mention is the Fokker-Planck equation found in 1917, a formula of central importancein statistical physics.

Planck’s early papers on thermodynamics very quickly attracted the attention and applause of the profes-sional world. Thus after a five-year period as unsalaried private lecturer at Munich, he was able to acceptan appointment as extraordinary professor of theoretical physics at the university of his home town Kiel,for the summer term of 1885. Merely four years later he became Gustav Kirchhoff’s successor as directorof the Institute of Theoretical Physics at the University of Berlin. Thus he invested not just one of the mostrespected professorships in physics in Germany but one of the few chairs devoted exclusively to theory.Planck’s professional activities – extending beyond his retirement in 1927 – wrought lifelong ties to Berlin.His character and scientific competence contributed decisively toward establishing theoretical physics asan independent subdiscipline of physics. These personal gifts also prepared the way to a blossoming ofthe field in Berlin and, after Helmholtz’s death in 1894, were brought to bear on the local development ofphysics overall, particularly on science policy and institutionalization.

At Berlin Planck also addressed a new field of research beginning in the middle of the 1890s, thetheory of heat radiation. Setting out from the contemporary advances and the general establishment ofMaxwell’s electrodynamics, he attempted to connect his thermodynamic studies with the electromagnetictheory of light. His main concern was finding a consistent interpretation of radiation as an electromagneticprocess by recourse to thermodynamics. In his inaugural address before the Prussian Academy of Sciencein the summer of 1894, Planck said in this regard: “It is likewise to be hoped that we may gain closerinsight into electrodynamic processes that are directly determined by temperature, such as are expressed inthermal radiation, without first having to take the arduous detour through the mechanistic interpretation ofelectricity.” [7]

3 Planck and the theory of heat radiation

The theory of heat radiation was one of the newest and most demanding fields of physics of the time.Little was known, for example, about the laws governing the emission by a hot object of heat or light rays.Moreover, it became evident that the related problems were unusually difficult and complex, both from

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the theoretical point of view as well as with regard to the experiments. One of the leading laboratories toexamine the problem of heat radiation was the German bureau of standards, the Physikalisch-TechnischeReichsanstalt (PTR). Founded in 1887 it was the country’s largest and most important institution of physicsand was located in Charlottenburg, at that time still a separate city from Berlin. Pursuant to its foundingcharter, the PTR conducted research in metrology as well as fundamental physics on problems of particularimportance or requiring intensive analysis or costly apparatus [8]. The physics of heat radiation fell under thiscategory. There was a burning need among scientists and engineers for reliable data about the fundamentallaws of thermal and luminous radiation, also for commercial applications. At the close of the 19th centurythe lighting industry and lamp technology had seen stormy development that revealed a serious lack ofreliable criteria for the assessment and certification of new light sources. Gas and electric lighting were inhot competition with each other. The goal set by the Reichsanstalt was, based on a generally valid theoryof heat radiation, to find a suitable radiation standard for light sources, in other words, an objective unitof luminosity. Its progress report for 1895 accordingly states: “The experiments on the radiation of blackbodies offer hope that it will be possible to arrive at better success regarding the idea expressed earlier thatradiation from a light source can be explained by that from a constant source of heat.” [9]

It is within this scientific and institutional context that Max Planck’s efforts to work on the problem ofheat radiation fall. He remained loyal to his own scientific program all the same, drawing the behavior ofentropy in processes of thermal radiation into the focus of his considerations. By working toward applyinghis earlier studies on the concept of entropy to Maxwell’s theory of the electromagnetic field, his purposewas not just to find out an exactly valid law of heat radiation and therefore of the entire electromagneticspectrum. Along this path he also wanted to expose an as yet unrecognized deeper connection between thetwo fields of thermodynamics and electrodynamics. Planck’s researches on heat radiation sought nothingless than final unification of the three fields of physics – mechanics, thermodynamics and electrodynamics– as a crowning finishing touch to classical physics. His epistemological interests included, moreover, thesearch for absolute, generally valid givens: “… the quest for laws which apply to this absolute appeared tome as the most sublime scientific pursuit in life.” [10]

One absolute magnitude of this type existed in the theory of heat radiation in the form of the radiationemitted from what was referred to as a black body. This radiation is independent of specific materialproperties and can be described by a universal, material-independent radiation function f(ν, T ), as GustavKirchhoff had discovered in 1859 [11]. However, complications of both an experimental and a theoreticalnature arose in establishing this function and posed a major challenge for physics in the final third of the19th century [12]. Stefan’s T 4-law and particularly its theoretical derivation on the basis of Maxwellianelectrodynamics by Ludwig Boltzmann (in 1884) [13] was an important advance – Hendrik Antoon Lorentzpraised it as a “pearl of theoretical physics”. The next important step was taken by Wilhelm Wien from thealready mentioned Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt in Berlin-Charlottenburg. In 1893 he formulatedwhat came to be called Wien’s displacement law

λ · T = constant ,

and three years later also Wien’s radiation law,

ρ(ν, T ) = αν3e−βν/T

where ρ(ν, T ) is the energy density for a given frequency and temperature and α, β are universal constants.In the years that followed, precision measurements were able to verify Wien’s radiation law and in early

1899 Max Planck eventually succeeded in deriving the law on the basis of thermodynamic considerations.Wien’s radiation law thus seemed to be the best, not only as far as empirical confirmation was concerned,but also as to its theoretical underpinning [14]. Planck presented the results of his research on this topicin May 1899 at a meeting of the Prussian Academy. He also expressed his conviction that his choice of“radiation entropy and hence also Wien’s energy distribution law, is a necessary consequence of applyingthe principle of the increase of entropy to electromagnetic radiation theory and that therefore the limits of



validity of this law, if such do exist at all, coincide with those of the second law of heat theory.” That meant,Wien’s radiation law should have “general validity.” [15]

In this connection Planck had already introduced the natural constant that was later described as theelementary quantum of action h. He pointed out that h, in combination with the velocity of light and thegravitational constant, opened the possibility “of positing units for length, mass, time and temperature,which … necessarily retain their significance for all times and for all – even extraterrestrial and extrahuman– cultures, and which therefore can be denoted as ‘natural constants’.” [16]

4 The quantum hypothesis

The PTR continued its series of precision measurements of heat radiation in conjunction with the relateddevelopment of appropriate measurement methods and instruments, even after Wien’s radiation law hadbeen confirmed. It was not only the Reichsanstalt’s primary research agenda to test the radiation lawsexperimentally. These precision measurements were supposed to provide the basis for defining a suitablestandard for sources of light. Discrepancies had been found between the theory and the measurement curvesfor the blackbody energy even before then. In the summer of 1900 Heinrich Rubens and Ferdinand Kurlbaum,fellows of the Technical College in Berlin-Charlottenburg and guest researchers at the PTR, employing theresidual ray method in the extreme ultraviolet region detected such blatant deviations from Wien’s radiationlaw that they could no longer be dismissed.

Rubens told his colleague Planck about the new findings before these results were reported at theupcoming colloquium of the Physical Society (Physikalische Gesellschaft). Friendship between these twomen explains this confidence only in part. Planck was considered by the physics community as the authorityon heat radiation because of his intense work on the problem during the last years. Gerhard Hettner, at thattime a doctoral student of Rubens, recalled: “When on Sunday, October 7th 1900, Rubens came with hiswife to visit Planck, the conversation also turned to the measurements that Rubens was working on. Heexplained that for his longest waves the law postulated recently by Lord Rayleigh … held. A generally validradiation formula would in any case have to come out in that form for large λT .” [17]

This comment prompted Planck to rethink his work on the theory of heat radiation, particularly hisderivation of Wien’s radiation law. That same evening he found a “happily guessed interpolation formula”for his colleagues’ experimental data and informed Rubens about it by postcard as well. They met again afew days later, at which time Rubens was able to declare that “the new formula agreed excellently with hisobservations.” [17] At the Physical Society’s meeting on October 19th, Ferdinand Kurlbaum then reportedabout the experiments he had conducted with Rubens on long wavelength emissions by the black body atvarious temperatures and Planck added a prepared statement during the following “thorough” discussion [18].This was his first formal presentation of his radiation formula in public. He had arrived at it by trial anderror, that is, formally modifying his earlier expression for the entropy for Planck oscillators. Instead of theentropy expression prescribed by Wien’s radiation law:

d2S

dE2=

constE

he set:

d2S

dE2=

constE(E + const)

whereupon, by integration and a number of intermediary steps, he obtained the new (Planckian) radiationformula:

ρ(ν, T ) =Aν3

eBν/T − 1



Fig. 2 On 14 December 1900 Max Planck presented the derivation of his radiation law to the German Physical Society.Shown is the corresponding page of the meeting protocol. © Archive of the DPG Berlin.

with A and B again being universal constants still to be determined and conformed to experiment. Theformula agreed perfectly with the known measurement data [19].

Eight weeks later, on December 14, 1900, at another meeting of the Physical Society, Planck then deliv-ered a first physical justification for his ad hoc introduced radiation law, his “happily guessed interpolationformula.” The elementary quantum of action h played only one part in it. A new (statistical) treatment ofthe radiation oscillators was its main basis [20]. This day is now generally considered – following Max vonLaue [21] – “the birthday of quantum physics”, even though Planck at that time did not have any concretenotions about a “quantum hypothesis” and its significance would only be recognized in the decade to come.

Planck’s difficulty at the time lay in abandoning his skepticism toward Boltzmann’s statistical physicsand its atomistic foundation. In order to derive the new radiation formula, he was compelled to use what hehad hitherto vehemently rejected, Boltzmann’s combinatorial definition of entropy with its probabilistic andatomistic character to determine the entropy function for the oscillating radiators [22]. This, the using ofthe “Boltzmann method”, he later described as an “act of desperation.” [23] Referring back to Boltzmann’sstatistical conception of thermodynamics, according to Planck, the entropy (S) of an observed system ofresonators in a given state was supposed to be set proportional to the natural logarithm of the probability(W ) in such a way that the resonators have a total energy E. Thus holds:

S = k ln W .



Venturing beyond Boltzmann, who already knew about this relation between S and W but had never writtendown the formula, Planck introduced the proportionality factor k, which is now known as the Boltzmannconstant k. He immediately realized its universal and absolute validity for statistical physics as a whole [24].In order to be able to work statistically with this new approach as Boltzmann would have, he used anothertrick that is likewise attributable to Boltzmann who had used it in 1877 for the statistics of a molecular gas.Planck subdivided the possible (continuous) energy states of his (identical) oscillators into cells of constant,but not arbitrarily small quantities, rather “energy elements” ε: 0 to 1ε; 1ε to 2ε; 2ε to 3ε; etc. From thenumber of possible partitions it was then possible to find out the probability of the given state and from thatto determine the sought entropy of the oscillators as well as the radiation field’s energy density. BecauseWien’s displacement law requires that the energy (E) be proportional to the frequency (ν), E was set = hν.Planck’s radiation law was the final result:

ρ(ν, T ) =8πν2

c3

hν

ehν/kT − 1.

Besides the variable magnitudes for temperature (T ) and frequency (ν), it just contains three other fun-damental natural constants: Boltzmann’s constant (k), the velocity of light (c) and (Planck’s) quantum ofaction (h). This must have specially gratified Planck. As mentioned at the outset, absolutes were the objectof his epistemological quest. In addition, the new radiation law permitted exact determination of these nat-ural constants at a precision that eclipsed former methods and results [25]. In the following weeks Plancksummarized the findings that had been presented before the Physical Society and they were published as aseparate paper in the Annalen der Physik [26].

Planck initially gave no concrete particulars about the physical significance of the “energy cells” intro-duced in his original papers. The procedure he had chosen thus had hardly anything in common with whatwe currently understand as quantization. The American historian of science Thomas S. Kuhn was the first togive a consistent account of this in 1978 [27]. Kuhn’s assessment was not left unchallenged [28]; howevermost historians of physics today do basically go along with Kuhn’s argumentation that Planck’s approachdid not constitute a quantization of the resonators in the modern sense [29].

Nevertheless, Planck’s derivation of the radiation law marked the first step in introducing the quantumconcept into physics. Planck himself only explicitly mentioned discrete energy states of his resonatorsaround 1908. Just two years previously, in his lectures on the theory of thermal radiation that surveyed theresearch on blackbody radiation, he was still cautioning against unfounded speculations about the physicalsignificance of the “element of action” (Wirkungselement). All in all, as he declared in 1910, it was prudentto “proceed as conservatively as possible in introducing the quantum of action h into the theory; i. e., onlythose modifications should be made to the existing theory as have proven to be absolutely necessary.” [30]We can generally conclude that initially neither Planck nor his contemporaries were aware of the significanceof the new radiation law and the fundamental importance of the natural constant h. One had “merely founda formula that apparently described the radiation conditions correctly. But whether there was somethingfundamentally new about the new quanta or not was not known,” Peter Debye noted in retrospect [31]. Thefirst sign of our modern understanding of the quantum-like character of atomic events and the central roleof h in its description came with Albert Einstein’s light-quantum hypothesis from 1905 as well as his andPaul Ehrenfest’s critical analysis of Planck’s radiation law (1905/06). Einstein’s analysis first showed thatPlanck’s radiation law was irreconcilably and fundamentally at odds with classical physics [32]. But eventhen, it took about another decade for the revolutionary consequences of Planck’s quantum hypothesis tobe established and for problems in quantum physics finally to become the focus of physical research [33].

Personally, Planck certainly did not exclude this possibility but he did not play a decisive role in the furtherdevelopment of his quantum idea. Its evolution was rather the work of a younger generation of physicists.After the first Solvay conference (in 1911), they began increasingly to review the problem of quanta andeventually forged quantum mechanics in its modern form. Planck took part in the discussions about thephysical and epistemological problems underlying it and actively promoted this new line of research publicly



in science policy as well as personally, extending a helping hand to its young representatives. But as to thedevelopment of the field itself, his only influence was that of a sympathetic critic [34].

5 Max Planck, the Physical Society and the Annalen

It may have taken more than a decade for Planck’s quantum hypothesis to establish itself and its originatorto be acknowledged as the “father of quantum theory” but around the turn of the century Max Planck wasalready being held in high regard as a physicist and numbered among the leading scholars of his day. Thisacclaim had come particularly from his trenchant analyses on the concept of entropy and on processes ofthermodynamic equilibria in physico-chemical systems [35]. The concept of entropy also formed the basisof his papers on the theory of radiation and the quantum hypothesis.

The fact that he was an influential initiator and participant of the first Solvay conference in Brusselsin 1911 [36], a summit of the leading contemporary physicists, documents his pioneering role in the earlyhistory of quantum theory as well as in physics in general. It manifests his competency about the issuesconcerning the interaction between radiation and matter being debated on that occasion, as well as his statusin physics of that time. It was due to this fact also that around 1910 Planck increasingly took on the roleof representative for the scientific community of Berlin and later of Germany as a whole. In doing so heassumed the place occupied by his mentor Hermann von Helmholtz during the last quarter of the nineteenthcentury. This was brought about not only by Planck’s extraordinary scientific rank and excellence as wellas his rising national and international prestige but also by the fact that he was always ready to take onadministrative and political functions for the sake of his field. Such activities agreed not only with hisprofessional ethos and his Prussian sense of duty but also with his conviction that modern science functionsoptimally only when the researchers themselves do not shy away from such responsibilities. ThereforePlanck was not an otherworldly or reclusive scientist – yet he was very wary about making any publicpolitical statements and only a few such expressions of opinion can be found in his popular papers andlectures from the second half of his life.

Planck’s caution about making political statements contrasts remarkably with the broad range of officialfunctions he was willing to assume as a science policy-maker. For instance, he served as dean repeatedly andin 1914/15 even as Rector magnificus of the University of Berlin, headed the Society of German Scientistsand Physicians (Gesellschaft Deutscher Naturforscher und Ärzte) during its jubilee year 1922, and for morethan a quarter of a century – between 1912 and 1938 – held the position of permanent secretary of thePrussian Academy of Sciences. From 1930 through 1937 he also served as president of the Kaiser WilhelmSociety for the Advancement of the Sciences. Thus he vested in some of the most powerful offices that ascientist could attain without enlisting himself completely into the service of the state.

Planck’s engagement on behalf of science and its professional autonomy started with his activities in thePhysical Society. He joined the society when it still bore the name “Physical Society of Berlin.” The minutesof the meeting of March 22, 1889 note: “Prof. Max Planck was nominated by A. König for membership”and his official admission into the society was approved at the next meeting [37]. The new member deliveredhis first talk some months later at the meeting on December, 12th 1889 and he spoke about the excitementof electricity and heat in electrolytic solutions. Other talks followed in subsequent years, numbering morethan two dozen talks, mostly during the period before World War I. Moreover – as he proudly reminiscedin 1938 on the occasion of his 80th birthday – he was able “to rival any other member … as far as the totalnumber of sessions that I attended is concerned. Particularly around the turn of the century, there was hardlya meeting at which I was not present and hardly an after-session gathering that I missed.” [38]

From the mid-1890s Planck became increasingly involved in the society’s administrative affairs, andalong the way gathered influence on its activities and profile: first as treasurer, later as member of the boardand finally also as the chairman of the society for the terms 1905/06, 1908/09 and 1915/16. During thesociety’s transition from the Physikalische Gesellschaft in Berlin to the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft(DPG) Planck was one of the driving forces behind opening its doors to all German physicists and was



Fig. 3 Number of Planck’s publications in Annalen der Physik and other journals, as indicated, versus publication year.

involved in the revisions to its statutes. So it was certainly not a matter of chance that the DPG namedhim honorary member in 1927 and two years later founded the “Max Planck Medal” for the golden jubileeof his doctoral degree [39]. This distinction remains the society’s most prestigious to this day. The firstmedallists of this award were its namesake and Albert Einstein. Other important anniversary dates also didnot go by unnoticed. In honour of Planck’s 60th birthday in 1918 and notably his 80th in April 1938 theDPG organized special sessions. On the latter occasion the society seized the opportunity to celebrate itselfas well, as a kind of self-promotion. All in all, the total of Planck’s activities for the Physical Society isimpressive and unmatched in the 150 years of the society’s history.

Equally unique and unmatched among his fellow physicists are Max Planck’s relations with the Annalender Physik. This was his preferred choice for publishing his scientific papers – starting with his first articleon saturation from 1881 [40] up to his last physical analyses on a synthesis between wave and corpuscularmechanics from 1940/41 [41]. Taking the three-volume compilation of Max Planck’s articles and talks as abasis [42], from the 121 articles in total, 41 appeared in the Annalen, i. e., 34%. Second came the Transactionsof the Prussian Academy, the Sitzungsberichte der Preußischen Akademie with 33 articles (27%), and asdistant followers came the Physical Society’s proceedings, Verhandlungen der Physikalischen Gesellschaft,the Zeitschrift für Physikalische Chemie, and the Physikalische Zeitschrift, each representing a little bitmore or less of 10% of the total count (see Figs. 3 and 4).

Besides that, Max Planck bore direct responsibility for this journal for over 50 years. With GustavWiedemann’s arrival as editor of the Annalen in 1877 came an important organizational change. Thenceforththe Physical Society shared the official responsibility for its publication. This was expressed on its titlepage by the additional phrase: “In collaboration with the Physical Society in Berlin and in particular withMr. H. Helmholtz.” Unfortunately no archival sources exist that indicate what this collaboration concretelymeant or what the nature of the related responsibilities for the Physical Society were – whether they pertainedto the content or were purely pecuniary. As far as Hermann Helmholtz was personally concerned, we mayassume that his collaboration was not limited to that of a “factotum.” He surely exerted his own influencein consultations with the main editor on the choice of papers for publication, of course particularly those



Fig. 4 (online colour at: www.ann-phys.org)Distribution of Planck’s publications. (“Son-stige” = other journals.)

concerning theoretical and general topics [43]. When Hermann von Helmholtz died in September 1894, thePhysical Society entrusted Max Planck with this duty or supervisory function for volume 54 (1895). Thuswe find on the frontispieces of the volumes appearing between 1895 and 1920 the note: “In collaborationwith the Physical Society in Berlin [– as of 1899: the German Physical Society –] and in particular with MaxPlanck.” When Paul Drude in Gießen was commissioned with the editorship in 1900, a fundamental reformwas instituted for the issuance of the Annalen that took physical shape in the appointment of a board for thejournal. The members of this panel of 5 physicists were Friedrich Kohlrausch, Georg Quincke, WilhelmConrad Röntgen, Emil Warburg as well as Max Planck. At 42 years of age Planck was by far the youngeston this advisory board; thus he represented a new generation of physicists. Moreover, he was the only realtheoretician among them. Planck undoubtedly regarded this appointment as a great honour. It was a clearsign that he now ranked among Germany’s first physicists.

6 Max Planck and Wilhelm Wien as editors of the Annalen [2,44]

Paul Drude’s term of office as responsible main editor hardly lasted 5 years. In the summer of 1906 Drudetook his own life, having not even reached the age of 43 [45]. Consequently the editorship of the Annalenwas again available and Wilhelm Wien and Max Planck agreed to take on this responsibility as of volume21 (1906). Wilhelm Wien was the responsible “main editor or redactor” but that did not diminish Planck’srole, as he continued to be a member of the advisory board and remained the go-between for the GermanPhysical Society. No documents have survived about the negotiations behind this appointment or whotook the crucial decisions. The existing correspondence between Max Planck and Wilhelm Wien1 – albeit

1 This exchange from the period 1900 to 1928 and comprising 200 letters is preserved at the manuscripts department of theStaatsbibliothek zu Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, as well as among the Wilhelm Wien papers at the archive ofthe Deutsches Museum in Munich.



involving only the later decision processes – does reveal, however, that it was the Physical Society that hadthe final say, more precisely, its science committee, besides the publisher. In 1890 Arthur Meiner had takenover the publishing house of Johann Ambrosius Barth and thereafter assumed the responsibility for theAnnalen. According to one of Planck’s letters [46], “pursuant to the statutes,” the DPG’s science committeerepresented “the society’s interests at the Annalen,” undertook to settle issues involving the staffing of theeditorial and advisory positions as well as those involving otherwise unresolvable disputes between theeditors and the board and other problems arising out of the editing of the Annalen and the other journalscarried by the society. The minutes or other documents about the meetings and decisions reached by thispanel have unfortunately not been preserved, so we must rely on secondary information from letters orrecollections by those who had been present.

Planck and Wien must have first discussed and possibly even reached some agreement about Drude’ssuccessor in July already, that is, just a few days after Drude’s death. Planck wrote in a letter from July 28th:

“Our letters have crossed paths; but since you would, in any event, soon like to receive wordabout your inquiry regarding the Annalen, I reply promptly to yours … I imagine my futureemployment as an editor as similar to now, just with the difference that I appear outwardly tobe bearing greater responsibility. This would find expression in that, just as Ostwald and van’tHoff appear side by side on the title page of the Zeitschrift für physikalische Chemie, the twoeditors would likewise be set next to each other. Only one of them can see to the managerialadministration, of course: on the other hand, in doubtful cases, when a rejection and return forrevision (shortening) is concerned, I would be consulted, as previously. This makes a differencefrom earlier insofar as I used to be able to deny any responsibility toward the outside (and havedone so, e. g., in the recent Denizot case), because I saw myself not as “coeditor” but merely asan occasional editorial collaborator.

In the future that would change.”

Wilhelm Wien, born in 1864 and since 1900 professor at Würzburg, was one of Germany’s most prominentyounger physicists. But this fact alone was surely not the only reason why he was taken into considerationas Drude’s successor in editing the Annalen. His investigations into the physics of heat radiation and canalrays were pioneering achievements that later (1911) earned him the Nobel prize. He was one of HermannHelmholtz’s pupils and had worked for many years at the Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt in Berlin-Charlottenburg. Thus he was, shall we say, part of the “Berlin biotope.” [47] As Planck was able to report,Paul Drude supposedly once described Wien as “his most worthy successor.” [48] Last but not least, Planck,who apparently played a central role in the matter, knew Wien very well and had been corresponding withhim and meeting him personally for many years. Berlin physicists had already picked Wien out to succeedDrude as director of the physics institute at the University of Berlin. Wien declined that appointment inSeptember because he had been unable to obtain the assurance of a new building for the institute, however,the Annalen question seemed to have reached a positive result. This can be gathered from one of Planck’sletters in September 1906: “Still, the inquiries by the board and by the science committee of the Phys. Soc.will take up some time yet; for, Meiner wants to invite all the proper authorities to express their officialopinions, and that is surely very useful too, because your introduction into the editorial office will thenproceed under the best of auspices.” [49]

A few weeks later everything was finally settled. In October 1906 the Annalen’s readership could alsobe officially informed about the change in the editorship in a notice by the publisher [50]. Meanwhilethe editorial work had already begun. Planck and Wien were discussing concrete details like how bestto handle rejection of a submitted paper without getting the Annalen drawn into wearisome and fruitlesspolemics with the author [51]. In general, such troublesome cases formed the majority of these discussionsbetween the co-editors because as main editor Wien was in charge of deciding about whether to accepta manuscript and largely did so on his own, only consulting with his co-editor about doubtful issues orsubmissions that he deemed exceeded his own expertise in physics [52]. Planck estimated that between



Fig. 5 Wilhelm Wien (1864–1928).© Archive of the DPG Berlin.

5 and 10% of incoming papers fell within this category [52]. The proportion that the historian of physicsLewis Pyenson figures for the Annalen is between 15 and 20% [53]. The majority of the rejections concernedarticles of questionable or insignificant content and those containing serious errors. Planck’s criticism ofsuch contributions was withering and his characterizations of their authors blunt. This starkly contraststhe style he used in his publications and other statements directed to the public. Then his tone was evertactfully obliging and diplomatic. Practically no personal judgments are to be found in his articles, but inhis letters to Wilhelm Wien there was no such restraint. Papers are characterized as “awkwardly weak,” [54]“mediocre,” [55] “scientifically completely worthless,” [56] “sheer nonsense,” [57] “nonsense,”(dummesZeug) [58] “senseless bungling,”(sinnlose Stümpereien) [59] or even “the work of a dilettante” [60] or“conceited bunk” (eitel Blendwerk) [61]; and “one couldn’t possibly print such rot.” [62] Some haplessauthor was certified as having an “amateurish way of thinking,” [63] and a certain Herr Kohl “did full creditto his name.” [64]

But the majority of the controversially debated papers were processed without any kind of polemicsensuing. Reason for a rejection existed primarily if the subject of the paper was of no current import inphysics, was incorrect in substance or not clearly or confusingly presented. The length of an article couldalso play an important role and overly “corpulent” manuscripts were returned with an allusion to insufficientspace or the Annalen’s guidelines or with the advice to cut it down. Dissertations were likewise rejected if –as, for instance, in Hans Geiger’s case – they were “only secondarily reckoned for the Annalen.” [65] As a



rule, in rejecting a paper – as we learn from a letter to Wien [66] – the approach was “that one proceeds asparsimoniously as possible with indications about the reasons to the authors, just so as not to commit oneselfofficially to any specific rule. The deeper reason for this is, of course, that one can’t say to someone’s face:your paper’s rubbish [taugt nichts].” Such a procedure naturally also assured that the author had little to goon in opposing the rejection of a given manuscript. Besides Planck’s uncontested authority as a scientist,this was another reason why throughout his many years as editor there were relatively few disputes foughtout in extenso, as for instance the later in detail discussed case of A. Bucherer.

For Planck, the pivotal point determining acceptance or rejection of a submission was “whether in anarticle … any kind of connections are made to physically verifiable issues” [67] and in this way to secure thatthe Annalen would publish the most interesting and cutting-edge results of contemporary physical research.On these points Max Planck’s and Wilhelm Wien’s interpretations seem to have coincided. Not a singleexample exists in the extant correspondence that would reflect some clash of opinion that the two couldnot settle between themselves. Wilhelm Wien was thus not resorting to euphemism or superficial amiabilitywhen in the summer of 1920 he confided to Planck that throughout their joint editorship of the Annalen“not even the slightest dissonance ever resulted between us.” [68]

Problems could develop not just between authors and the two editors or even between the two editorsthemselves, but likewise with the Annalen’s advisory board. As already mentioned at the beginning, thispanel was appointed by the Physical Society, that is, its science committee, to which the journal was directlyaccountable and which otherwise had the final say in any cases of conflict. It had been established during areorganization of the Annalen in 1900 and was composed of maximally six members, all famous and veryrecognized physicists who through their exceptional expertise had gained the general respect of the physicscommunity in Germany:

The Members of the Advisory Board of the Annalen der Physik 1900–1945

Max Planck (1858–1947) 1900– 1945

F. Kohlrausch (1840–1910) 1900–1910

W. Voigt (1850–1919) 1910–1919

W. C. Röntgen (1845–1923) 1900– 1923

G. Quincke (1834–1924) 1900– 1924

E. Warburg (1846–1931) 1900– 1930

W. Gerlach (1889–1979) 1930–1945

F. Paschen (1865–1947) 1929– 1945

R. Pohl (1884–1976) 1929– 1945

Following the death of a board member, the editors apparently had a right to submit suggestions to thePhysical Society and the publisher. This is documented by the case of Friedrich Kohlrausch [69] and weread in a letter Planck wrote to Wien after Kohlrausch’s death:

“About the reappointment of the position on the board of the Annalen vacated by Kohlrausch’sdeath, I also asked the other members of the board, Quincke and Röntgen, besides Warburg, andreceived from them all the unanimous reply that they fully agree to Voigt’s joining the board.Now, I think it suits the purpose best if you write directly to Meiner in the name of the editors thatthe editors and the board wish to fill the vacant position with Voigt and then, provided Meinerapproves, which is surely to be expected, indicate this to Voigt (or have Meiner do this (wouldprobably be better)), by which the business is then perfected.” [70]

Not merely as a coeditor or a member of the editorial staff but, indeed, as a member of the advisoryboard and an in-house power of the Physical Society [71], Max Planck should be regarded as the Annalen’s“strong man,” if not its “grey eminence.” The way the work was distributed between him and Wilhelm Wien



and their separate roles in the editing of the journal reflect this. Strategic matters – such as in the abovequote – were mostly broached by Planck. Letters from the summer of 1920 also show this. At that time,the ‘journal problem’, new restrictions imposed on publishing necessitated by the economic shortages ofthe post-war period, was being hotly debated in the Physical Society and among physicists generally [72].Planck likewise led the discussions about the general role played by the advisory board. He always spoke infavor of a high degree of independence for the editors, emphasizing that in the reviewing an editor “take fullliberty in every case … not officially subordinate himself to any specific rule.” [73] Concretely put, the twoeditors alone “are to decide on the acceptance or shortening of papers,” without the board, for example [74].

Thus the board’s role remained solely limited to the supervision and ultimate settlement of problemcases. Two are documented in the correspondence between Max Planck and Wilhelm Wien. One involvedan interminable quibble, as it were, with Alfred Bucherer [2]. In the fall of 1906 he had submitted amanuscript to the Annalen in which, embarking from Einstein’s papers, he had postulated a new principleof relativity that Planck deemed “entirely worthless” and therefore advocated be rejected. In view of “theauth[or’s] standing as private lecturer in Bonn,” however, he wanted to avoid a too curtly worded refusal,especially considering Bucherer’s reputation as an incorrigible squabbler in such situations [75]. Thatturned out to be the case here, too, so the board had to step in to clear up the matter, ending up “settling”it (in the editors’ favour) as well [76]. Later on Planck and Wien had to contend with other purporteddevelopments of Einstein’s theory of relativity by Bucherer that Planck thought would “not be a feather inthe Annalen’s cap” (würde den Annalen nicht zur Zierde gereichen) [77]. Nevertheless Planck advised adiplomatic approach and considered it “questionable to decline the paper directly, as Mr. Bucherer is, after all,a “full honorary professor”.” [78] A more delicate case concerned Georg Quincke, a nestor of experimentalphysics in Germany and himself a member of the board. In the spring of 1920 he had submitted a paperto the Annalen editors that sought to explain the results of experiments by the assumption of longitudinalelectric oscillations. This claim contradicts Maxwellian electrodynamics and Quincke’s argumentation wasnot convincing either, so Planck suggested that he consult with Emil Warburg “about this very fatal businessfor the Annalen editorial effort … strictly confidentially and on his own authority.” Likewise on the board,Emil Warburg was a long-time colleague of Quincke familiar enough with his working approach for himto have “sufficient objectivity to be able to judge the circumstances clearly.” [79]

Although Warburg very quickly came to share Planck’s and Wien’s opinion that the paper did not belongin the Annalen [80], it was agreed that the matter be resolved without personal offence for Quincke byhis “being talked into voluntarily withdrawing the manuscript for the time being.” [81] Almost two yearspassed without any progress being made. After Warburg likewise recommended “simply to tell the ‘truth’– naturally with as much sugar coating around the bitter pill as possible,” [81] Wilhelm Wien as managingeditor finally took action. In a letter to the “doyen of the experimental art” he set forth that “the interpretationof the experiments as an effect of electric longitudinal oscillations is in direct contradiction to the generallaws of electrodynamics that until now have been upheld by the most disparate findings. As interestingand important as your experiments undoubtedly are, the editors do not regard the results as such as couldyield conclusions of so far-reaching and revolutionary a significance as would be the existence of electriclongitudinal waves. It would therefore rather be advisable to strengthen the proof of the existence of electriclongitudinal oscillations in such a way as to place beyond all doubt these revolutionary findings for theentire foundation of modern physics.” [82]

Whether the outcome of this exchange with Wien or other efforts eventually led to a retraction ofQuincke’s manuscript by the turn of the year 1922 to 1923 cannot in retrospect be verified beyond doubt. Inany event Planck was able to add to his new year’s greetings to his colleague congratulations “that the difficultQuincke affair seems to have been settled without adverse consequences.” [83] Not every controversial caserequired such a hard struggle by the two editors for a peaceful resolution. Their correspondence indicatesthat in dubious cases Planck frequently took pains to give due acknowledgment to the author’s personalstanding, academic rank or merits. For example Johannes Stark’s experimental mastery was recognizedwithout reserve. Yet “his often untenable, almost always arbitrary theoretical conceptions” [84] were hardto swallow. “… if he does not better himself, we shall have to shut the door on him one day. But I would be



unhappy to do that to the discoverer of the Doppler effect on canal rays, and then, only in an emergency.” [85]A similar route was taken in the case of Franz Kiebitz, fellow at the research department of the ImperialInstitute of Telegraphy in Berlin. The technical content of his paper on differential equations describing acoupled pair of oscillating circuits [86], in Wien’s opinion, should rather be published in the Jahrbuch fürdrahtlose Telegrafie than in the Annalen. Planck emphasized Kiebitz’s scientific merits, pointing out thatthe paper had been “written accurately.” For that reason it appeared subsequently in the Annalen, especiallysince – Planck likewise explained – apparently “a principle risk … [seemed] not to be attached to it, becauseit is clearly of a finalizing character and the treated topic completely finished off, so nothing more, at leastof a principle nature, can be linked to it.” [87] Also in the case of the Prague physicist Frantisek Kolacek,Planck had qualms about simply rejecting the submitted paper. In Planck’s opinion “the author has alreadyprovided so many contributions to the Annalen, some of them quite valuable, that we shall have to tolerateone of lesser quality for once. What a pity that the author as a person is always so inseparably linked toeach of his elaborations.” [88] A linkage of quite another sort existed in the case of Gunnar Nordström. Hewas born in 1881, had studied physics in Göttingen and had just started a scientific career as lecturer atHelsinki’s technical college. Although Planck assessed the paper he submitted as “somewhat unclear,” [89]he nonetheless proposed it be accepted because “especially for the first contributed mailing one shoulddemonstrate as much goodwill as possible so that the person concerned gets to have a say at all. Later on,one may be more cautious, all right.” [90]

Consequently, Planck as an editor did not simply follow abstract or indeed “sacred” principles. TheAnnalen’s relationship with its authors also mattered to him, in particular to establish solid linkages withprominent or talented physicists. However, he encouraged nurturing such ties not just with individualauthors but also with institutions like the Berlin Imperial Institute of Physics (PTR). Founded in 1887 byH. von Helmholtz and W. von Siemens, the PTR became the largest and most important physical institutionin Germany by the turn of the century. In addition to its routine metrological measurements and research italso pursued high-level basic research in physics. It was there that the precision measurements on blackbodyradiation were conducted that inspired Max Planck to advance the quantum hypothesis. The Annalen wasone of the publication organs preferred by the PTR’s physicists. Conflicts did nevertheless occasionally arise.When in the summer of 1907 Ernst Gehrcke and Otto Reichenheim submitted an article that was based on atalk presented before the Physical Society and hence had already been published in its proceedings [91], thischallenged an issue of principle in editorial policy. As a rule, only original publications were accepted. Thusensued a debate about the pros and cons, which Emil Warburg was also brought into. At that time Warburgwas the president of the PTR as well as member of the Annalen’s board and a very well accepted memberof the physical community in Germany and abroad. Planck cautioned to keep things in perspective and steplightly because “the collaboration of the Reichsanstalt on the Annalen [is] one of its most valuable assetsthat under no condition may be sacrificed for the sake of a formal principle. Proof of this is the abundanceof the most valuable Annalen articles that come from the R.A. [Reichsanstalt]. Their loss in future couldeventually spell the Annalen’s doom. That is why also for that reason I am decidedly in favour of acceptingthe paper by G. and R. and would regret it if within the R. A. the thought arose that the Annalen’s editors didnot place much importance on the R. A.’s collaboration.” [92] This reasoning was followed and the paperby Gehrcke and Reichenheim appeared in its submitted form in the Annalen’s 23th volume [93].

This problem case touched on the Annalen’s relationship with other periodicals and publications inphysics. The Annalen’s editors viewed themselves and their professional journal as an outlet for origi-nal papers that treated a problem in physics definitively. This contrasted against the Verhandlungen derPhysikalischen Gesellschaft, which generally documented contributions presented during the meetings ofthe Physical Society and was thus “more for preliminary papers destined for rapid publication.” [94] Thecontribution by Gehrcke and Reichenheim shows, however, that there was a willingness to make excep-tions to the rule. Exceptions were similarly granted for reprinting of the session reports by the Germanacademies and other scholarly societies. As Wien argued in a letter to Planck [95], such texts “are receiveddirectly by only a limited number of professors, initially to their generally not large membership, then tothe libraries and the small number of people who procure their own,” whereas the Annalen “addresses an



audience that is mostly more numerous.” The other periodicals published alongside the Annalen were anentirely different problem. They were very much perceived as rivals. At first the only competition was thePhysikalische Zeitschrift, founded and principally supported by the Göttingen physicists in 1899. However,its profile resembled that of the DPG’s proceedings, tuned rather toward prompt, up-to-date reporting. Oneof its specialties was survey articles on particular physical problems. Thus the Physikalische Zeitschrift andthe Annalen der Physik each served very specific needs of the physical community and were able to coexistvery nicely. Thanks to its heritage and nimbus, the Annalen managed to secure its dominance at least untilWorld War I. This “even outwardly perceptible advantage ” – as Planck put it to Wien in 1907 [96] – over its“junior partner” is mirrored in the correspondence between the editors. There is the occasional discussionabout “shuffling off [specific papers] onto the Physikalische Zeitschrift. Then more space remains for us forreal physical analyses.” [97] Incidentally, new activities in this field were observed with suspicion. Whenin 1916 Stefan Meyer from the Vienna Radium Institute and Rudolf Seeliger, a fellow of the Reichsanstalt,planned a new journal for atomic and radiation physics, Wien recommended that “for the time being theyshould definitely wait and see” and commented this idea drastically and with nationalistic overtones: “Tome this seems to be a special Austrian endeavour to accommodate the copious numbers of not very valuablescientific papers from Vienna’s Radiological Institute. Seen from the position of the Annalen, this is just finewith us. We have not received so much valuable material from Austria that we should be unduly disturbed bythe decrease. I just don’t understand that a publisher nowadays can enter into such a dubious endeavor andthat a physicist from the Reichsanstalt feels himself compelled to participate in such an Austrian endeav-our.” [98] Planck in his reply also appealed “to wait for the time being … besides the fact that I also have noidea what measures one could resort to in this matter.” [99] The opinion of both was more moderate whenin 1910 Waldemar von Ignatowsky and Eugen Jahncke had the idea to set up a new journal for theoreticalphysics. Planck communicated this to Wien with the words: “What do you think of this? On the one handit could perhaps be very good for the Annalen to be somewhat relieved of the influx of theoretical papers,on the other hand a stricter division of theoretical and experimental research is not at all agreeable. I havebeen asked to support this affair, but for the time being have strong reservations.” [100] Incidentally, noneof these plans could have been realized for not only did the scientific community have its reservations, butalso the economic shortages and political chaos worked against them.

As the years went by, the Annalen’s leadership among German physics journals and its role of mouldingpublic opinion seeped away. The reforms instituted in the periodicals business after the war leveled theplaying field for physics journals. Yet it was not the Physikalische Zeitschrift that challenged the Annalen’sranking as the leading physics journal in the German language. A relative newcomer, the Zeitschrift fürPhysik founded in 1920, took over this position.With its great openness toward developments in modernphysics, it emerged as the most important publishing organ for the young fields of quantum theory andquantum mechanics. This and the fact that – as Planck noted in a letter to Wien [101] – “the Annalenoften presents things that had already been briefly announced elsewhere” caused the journal to becomeincreasingly “boring,” particularly for younger and more innovative physicists. They, along with others intheir field, began to lose interest in the Annalen. The result was the loss of what Planck lamented as themajority of his regular contributors during the 1920s [102]. Among them were also the physicists from theReichsanstalt, although they were not exactly pioneers of modern physical research. This shows that nowthe “outwardly perceptible advantage that we possess over other journals” [103] had finally expired and theAnnalen no longer deserved the part of primus inter pares among German-speaking physics journals.

7 The Annalen and modern physics

A profound revolution in the foundations of physics coincided with Max Planck’s and Wilhelm Wien’s co-editorship of the Annalen. Quantum theory and relativity established themselves as the two bearing pillars ofmodern physics. Max Planck’s own quantum hypothesis and the theory of blackbody radiation underlyingit were important stepping-stones in this development. Not just quantum theory but also the theory of



relativity gained an important boost from his attention. He was one of the physicists to very quickly realizethe revolutionary significance of Einstein’s Annalen paper on the electrodynamics of moving bodies andwas instrumental in furthering lasting appreciation of Einstein’s theory of relativity [104].

The fact that the majority of the theses Planck supervised before World War I examined related problemsreveals the depth of his interest and active promotion of relativity theory [105]. So it was by no means acoincidence that Planck’s graduates were among the Annalen’s contributing authors. Kurd von Mosengeil isa particularly tragic case in this connection. Shortly after submitting his dissertation he had a fatal accident inthe Alps. Planck went out of his way to prepare this manuscript on relativistic radiation theory for publicationhimself, also making some substantial additions to it [106]. Another of his doctoral candidates, WilhelmHeil, wrote an equally noteworthy dissertation, entitled “On the Theory of Kaufmann’s Experiments onthe Electromagnetic Deflection of β-Rays,” in 1909. It weighed the pros and cons of the contemporaneoustheories of the electron by Abraham and by Lorentz and Einstein, reaching the conclusion that the availableexperimental data did not offer any basis for deciding between the two theories. Erich Hupka, on the otherhand, arrived at much more positive conclusions. He was another graduate student, but working underHeinrich Rubens’s guidance at the university’s institute of physics in Berlin. His cathode-ray measurementsto test the velocity-dependence of the mass of an electron claimed support for the theory of relativity [107].Heil criticized Hupka’s results in an outspokenly polemical style [108] and it fell to Planck, as both editorand doctoral advisor, to assume the “role of honest broker” [109] in this controversy. After meeting with theopponents personally and some lengthy correspondence, he managed to reach a compromise acceptable toall without bruising the sensitivities of either party. In the end, the papers and criticisms of both were ableto appear in the Annalen’s volumes 31 (1910) and 33 (1911) [110].

Other disputes did not cost Planck as much time and effort, as the co-editors quite quickly becameunanimous about rejecting papers that were blatantly faulty in substance as well as about “shuffling off”analyses about the principle of relativity “which rather regard formulation, conceptualization, definitions(rigid bodies!)” onto other periodicals [111]. Planck and Wien shared the view that in the long run theoreticalphysics would become bland if it moved too far away from experimental findings. The editing of submissionson the theory of relativity was ultimately conducted along these lines [2]. For example, the paper by aMr. Wisniewski was rejected even though “there is possibly a useful core” to his theory of gravitation. “Yetit is at present very hard to decide … there are simply too few firm indicators for a complete theory ofgravitation. (About the Einsteinian one, which does not quite agree with me, observations at the next solareclipse will hopefully yield a decision.)” [112]

In another case, a paper by Hermann Weyl on gravitation theory [113], about which there could be “noquestion of an experimental verification of his theory” either, there was a greater willingness to act moregenerously and approve its appearance in print. That “the auth[or] stands at the pinnacle of the research ofhis time” [114] spoke in its favor. Because considerations on non-Euclidean geometry played an importantpart in Weyl’s paper, Planck was set before the general question of “to what extent such analyses, whichwithout a doubt are bound to multiply heavily, belong in the Annalen der Physik … For the time being,especially as long as they appear in close connection with gravitation theory, one will probably have toconcede them guest rights.” [114] Such guest rights were later also granted to Cornelius Lanczos with hispaper on the planar distribution of matter in Einstein’s theory of gravitation [115], even though here tooPlanck asked “whether the value of such analyses is suitably proportionate to their physical breadth.” [116]

Although Planck welcomed the fact, that “more and more mathematicians begin to take an interest inphysical problems”, he found it “always bad, when a mathematician makes physical hypotheses.” [117] Bythe way, even David Hilbert was included in this verdict. Planck found his “deductions about the radiationequilibrium formally interesting and general”, but for physics absolutely uninteresting [118]. In this sensehe was concerned to define an editorial policy that would exclude all too mathematical papers. Howeverhe was willing to make exceptions, for instance regarding a very mathematical paper on the mechanicalfoundations of thermodynamics by the Heidelberg physicist (and also later philosopher) Paul Hertz. But thisinvestigation was dealing with such an important and difficult aspect for understanding statistical mechanics,that in this case “the comprehensiveness is a necessity for clarity” [119] and the author was even allowed to



publish his work in two parts [120]; of course the problem discussed was also very close to Planck’s ownthermodynamical work. We also know, that Planck was always very interested in general questions and tookthe view, that “epistemology is basically no less important as mathematics”, but nevertheless he sought toexclude this “supporting science” (Hilfswissenschaft) of physical research. Therefore the Annalen shouldnot accept in principle “purely epistemological investigations as it also does not publish pure mathematicalor technical papers. For that we have other journals.” [121]

When in the early 1920s relativity theory became the topic of public controversy and even politicaldebate [122], it also had repercussions on the editing of the Annalen. The principles discussed aboveregarding overly mathematical and philosophically oriented papers became relevant. A letter by Plancksuggests that Wien had recommended having the Physical Society’s newly founded editorial committeeimpose a general rule in order to be able to regulate the acceptance of papers on relativity theory or evenprohibit them across the board. Planck had reservations about acquiescing to what was effectively a banbut conceded that such articles did have to be handled with great caution and restraint. Nevertheless thedecision should always be made on a “case-by-case” basis, because

“I could imagine the case of a relativistic paper of truly current physical merit arriving sometime,without it happening to contain new correlations to observable quantities. It could, e. g., showknown relations in a new, general connection; and then I would find it a shame if we wanted tobar ourselves from the possibility of accepting such a paper by a general regulation. Therefore, Ithink we should maintain our present practice at the Annalen for the moment.” [123]

During the twenties it became the usual practice for only the occasional paper on relativity theory togain entrance into the Annalen because – as one author was informed – “pursuant to the [editors’] opinion,from the physical aspect the theory is closed.” [124] Such restrictions also concerned articles criticizingrelativity theory. E. Gehrcke complained in a letter to W. Wien when the Annalen editors had rejected apaper by S. Mohorovic from Zagreb, “a very pro-German foreigner” and staunch critic of Einstein’s theoryof relativity [125]. This had not only deeply depressed the author but prompted Gehrcke to comment that “itdoes not appear to me good that papers touching on relativity theory be rebuffed so very severely and abruptly,especially when it regards papers suited to clarifying the essence of the relativistic method while casting thematter in a critical light.” [126] Despite this appeal, the decision was not reexamined and Mohorovic wasnot able to publish his paper in the Annalen. There certainly was a willingness to bend this principle fromtime to time nonetheless, as the following case clearly demonstrates. When Erwin Schrödinger submitted tothe Annalen a paper on the accomplishment of the relativity condition in classical mechanics in the springof 1925 [127], nothing stood in the way of its going into press. Planck’s comment about it was: “It really isgood that we did not commit ourselves to rejecting all relativistic speculations. Cases simply do vary andthe editors must have a certain amount of freedom.” [128]

Whereas essays on relativity theory could count on a sympathetic and positive welcome by the Annalen’seditors at least until World War I, after which enthusiasm leveled off, the reception that papers on quantumtheory experienced was almost the reverse. For many years Max Planck could not conceal his scepticismabout the developments in radiation and quantum theory. It is not surprising that it would also find itsexpression in his correspondence with Wilhelm Wien and his editorial work for the Annalen. One ofPlanck’s letters from 27 February 1909 reads:

“Soon I too am going to say a word about radiation theory again, especially since Einstein isnow going to publish all sorts of reservations as well (in the Physikalische Zeitschrift). He arrivesat the assumption that the elementary quanta h have meaning also for processes in a pure vacuum.I don’t believe that as yet, and surely neither do you, Lorentz quite certainly neither. Why shouldone complicate the theory unnecessarily? There are enough difficulties as it is, and one can bequite satisfied if everything can be clumped together in a single place, the processes inside themolecule.” [129]



In the fall of the same year he reported to Wien:

“As to the radiation, a new way out occurred to me that appears to me to be tractable eventhough it leads me even further away from Einstein and Stark. The energy of the resonators doesnot need to be an integral multiple of hv at all, nor, indeed, the energy of the free radiation.” [130]

In a letter dated February 21, 1910 Planck even speaks of “J. Stark’s phantasms,” probably a referenceto Stark’s papers in the Physikalische Zeitschrift, in which various arguments in support of the light quan-tum hypothesis were discussed [131]. An embarrassing error in physics had escaped Stark’s notice thatA. Sommerfeld, among others, had pointed out to him, triggering a bitter controversy between the twophysicists [132]. Planck was not sparing either with his critique of Stark’s bold physical interpretations.For instance, he regarded “Stark’s application of the quantum hypothesis to the Doppler effect as veryattackable.” [133] Even so, such critical evaluations did not hinder him from regarding the young Stark as a“very talented and accomplished man” [134] and a “mind rich in ideas,” [135] also assessing his research atvery least as “stimulating.” The discovery of the Stark effect in 1913 ultimately confirmed this assessmentand he considered it “a sign that this man does have some mettle. Though he does have more luck in trialsthan in studies, the main thing is that he does deliver.” [136]

These reservations about the first attempts at quantum theory led at least in one case to a pioneeringpaper from the early history of quantum theory not being published in the Annalen. Arthur Erich Haas hadsubmitted his analysis of the physical significance of the elementary action quantum h to the Annalen’seditorial office at the end of 1909. It was the first paper to relate the nature of h with atomic structure [137];nevertheless it was not approved for publication [138]. When the paper subsequently appeared in the spring of1910 in the Sitzungsberichte of the Viennese Academy, Planck congratulated himself on “the adeptness withwhich we avoided being duped by him. Misunderstandings, completely arbitrary assumptions, unacceptableresults follow each other in quick succession …” [138]

Notwithstanding this faux pas, Planck cannot generally be charged with ignorance in the face of newideas and developments. Five years later when he refereed a paper by Thomas Wereide, lecturer of physicsat Oslo University, on the exchange of energy between the ether and matter, he supported publication despitenumerous misplaced speculations [139]. He merely recommended a careful recalculation of the derivations,noting that “in this virgin field a certain latitude [must] reign, otherwise science does not come across newideas.” [140] All in all, as Planck himself confessed about his editing, he apparently rather shied away from“the charge of suppressing alien opinions than of too much lenience in their evaluation.” [141]

Planck and Wien were quite sceptical about the developments in the early history of quantum theory,and even more so about the emerging quantum mechanics. For both of them it was too radical a breakwith existing principles in classical physics. In a letter to Planck at the turn of the years 1924/25, Wiennoted in this regard, with a tinge of resignation: “Theoretical physics really is in a peculiar state.” [142] Inthe following year when New Year’s greetings were again being exchanged, something new had come upin this regard, perhaps even giving a spark of hope. Erwin Schrödinger had submitted his famous paperson wave mechanics to the Annalen for publication and Wien deemed them so unquestionably suitablethat he merely let Planck know that “a paper by Schrödinger [will] soon appear in the Annalen [143], inwhich the quantum problem is interpreted as a problem of characteristic oscillations such that the lines ofthe Balmer series appear as suspensions between two very high-frequency oscillations. I am curious whatyou will say about it.” [144] In reply Planck wrote his colleague: “I am in suspense about Schrödinger’spaper on spectral lines. I trust his acumen and his imagination enough for him to be able to make a bolderleap.” [145] After reading Schrödinger’s papers, Planck felt his verdict vindicated. He found “the businessextraordinarily interesting,” [146] indeed, as he enthusiastically exclaimed: “The things by Schrödinger arewonderful. I am now studying Schlesinger’s (probably: Schrödinger – DH) differential equations with greatfervour.” [147]



8 With the Annalen after Wien

Soon after this moment of glory in the history of the Annalen der Physik the collaboration between thejoint editors Max Planck and Wilhelm Wien came to an end. Having just reached the age of 64, WilhelmWien passed away in Munich on August 30, 1928. The Physical Society appointed the physicist fromMarburg, Eduard Grüneisen, to succeed him as main editor. Whether this choice had something to do withthe fact that Grüneisen was not only a colleague of Planck’s but also a family acquaintance can no longerbe reconstructed today, as no documents about this procedure have come down to us. In any event, theremust at least have been a similarly collegial friendship between Planck and Grüneisen as had existed withhis predecessor. Perhaps it was even a teacher-pupil partnership, as Grüneisen, born in 1877, had attendedPlanck’s lectures on theoretical physics and Planck had been one of the evaluators of his dissertation. Theyhad not lost sight of each other even after he had claimed his degree, because since 1904 Grüneisen hadbeen on the staff of the Imperial Institute of Physics in Berlin (PTR) – ultimately becoming director of thedepartment for electricity and magnetism – until his appointment as professor at Marburg in 1927.

As neither correspondence between Planck and Grüneisen nor the papers of either physicist have beenpreserved, we know very little about their editorial collaboration. Only the speech of Eduard Grüneisenon the occasion of Planck’s 80th birthday in 1938 is extant, where he mentioned, that “for decades Planckhas participated with words and deeds in the service of Annalen. The extent of his participation, however,is known only to the editors and the publishing house.” [148] But neither were they able to stem the tideagainst the Annalen. Its standing as the leading journal for basic research in physics in the German languagewas eventually lost to the Zeitschrift der Physik; internationally it lost to the Physical Review. The periodof the Third Reich also falls within the Planck-Grüneisen co-editorship. On the face of it, the journal’scharacter seemed to change little. As a result of the arbitrary measures and racist laws imposed by theNational Socialists an unprecented exodus of high- ranking scientists took place during this period [149].A disproportionate share of physicists were among them, which only gradually became apparent in theAnnalen at first. Until the second half of the thirties Jewish physicists and emigrés still numbered amongits contributing authors. The journal was thus able to maintain its scientific character. Nor did it compro-mise itself in any way as far as the elaborations of the Aryan physics movement (Deutsche Physik) wereconcerned [150]. That remained the almost exclusive prerogative of the newly founded Zeitschrift für diegesamte Naturwissenschaft. The Annalen kept alive a sense of its own scientific tradition – also manifestin a certain conservatism respecting the innovative developments of modern physics. During the twenties itled to a poor reflection of the development of quantum mechanics in the Annalen’s pages; likewise duringthe thirties only very few articles can be found covering topics in nuclear physics. Nevertheless, the currentsof the time did not leave the Annalen untouched.

The special issue celebrating Arnold Sommerfeld’s 70th birthday is one illustration. When the initialpreparations were being made for it in the spring of 1938, the publisher approached the editors with the wishthat only “Aryans” be solicited for contributions to it. The editors accepted this preference with practicallyno resistance, even though it constituted a case of discrimination and exclusion of fellow physicists that hadhitherto seen no precedence in physics publishing within Germany. The Sommerfeld jubilee issue of theAnnalen thus appeared at the end of 1938 containing contributions only by “unencumbered” (unbelasteter)authors [151]. Some of Sommerfeld’s pupils, like Wolfgang Pauli, were not content to lodge an internalprotest [152]. They organized a more suitable birthday issue in The Physical Review [153]. At the beginningof 1938 the Annalen had, in addition, honoured Max Planck’s 80th birthday with a double issue as well [154].In it, 22 physicists – ranging from Planck’s closest friend and student Max von Laue to Robert A. Millikanat Caltech in California – acknowledged the scientific merits of this Nestor of German theoretical physics.However, there too one searches in vain for Jewish colleagues among the list of authors. Planck’s doctoralstudents Fritz Reiche and Hartmut Kallmann, for example, or his erstwhile assistant Lise Meitner aremissing, along with many other fellow physicists who were closely associated, scientifically as well aspersonally, with Planck. Whether this was again the regulatory or discriminatory effect of the publisher’sor the Nazi science authorities’ wishes is not overtly documented but the dedication by the advisory board



Fig. 6 Annalen der Physik32 (1938), page 1.

and the publishing house seems to indicate as much: “To the teacher of generations of physicists, for whomthe beauty of theoretical physics became an adventure through his lucid, simple presentation, who look upto him in love and admiration and would gladly have lauded their master in this honorary issue in greaternumbers than circumstances allow” [155]; somewhat more frankly the editor in chief of the Annalen, EduardGrüneisen, stated in the anniversary speech mentioned earlier, that Planck “should recognize this jubileeissue as an expression of gratitude, not just from the few, who actually contributed to this issue, but alsofrom the many undisclosed authors, who would have contributed had circumstances permitted.” [156]

When in 1943 a single-page dedication in honour of Max Planck’s 85th birthday was drafted by theeditors, the board and the publisher [157], it was supposed to be one of the Annalen’s very last issues.Growing shortages and the declaration of total war necessitated that most of Germany’s periodicals stoptheir presses, among them the Annalen der Physik. Thus also ended Planck’s practical involvement as itsofficial and acting editor – an end that, after almost fifty years of active participation Planck surely hadimagined otherwise. When in the summer of 1946 the publishing house of Johann Ambrosius Barth inLeipzig was granted a license by the Soviet Military Administration in Germany to revive the Annalenby releasing its 6th series, Max Planck was again member of the journal’s advisory board and editorialcommittee. However, in this capacity he certainly did not become practically engaged anymore – the maineditorial duties were assigned to Friedrich Möglich in Berlin, who together with Eduard Grüneisen formed



Fig. 7 Max Planck around 1938.© Archive of the MPG Berlin.

the actual editorial committee. Yet in its first issue, a † is set after Planck’s name: dated January 3, 1947,it was nevertheless only able to appear that fall. Like the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft, of which he hadagain invested the presidency on an interim basis in the summer of 1945 and shortly later renamed as Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, the publisher and the Annalen’s editorial office also wanted to secure for the futureof its journal the symbolic capital of scientific reputation and international acclaim associated with MaxPlanck’s name. His death on October 3, 1947 in Göttingen was then taken as an opportunity to publish acommemorative volume in honour of this “very great in physics” and long-time editor of the journal. Itappeared on the 90th anniversary of Planck’s birth in the summer of 1948. Even though – as the editorialputs it – “unfortunately, that sombre cloud which today darkens the relations between Germany and theworld, still casts its shadow on this enterprise as well,” the community of physicists or Planck adherentswas largely reunited again and among the contributing authors one finds numerous colleagues and friendswho had been forced to emigrate after 1933 or had suffered discrimination – ranging from Lise Meitner inStockholm, to James Franck and Max Born in Chicago and Edinburgh, respectively, and Planck’s last PhDstudent Hartmut Kallmann, who under the wing of a so-called “privileged mixed marriage” had been ableto outlast the Third Reich.

9 Conclusion

Max Planck’s death ended more than a uniquely long term of responsibility and editorship for the Annalen.It also ended an epoch for the periodical itself, an epoch that coincides almost identically with Max Planck’s



life and during which the journal was able to establish itself finally as a leading journal of physics in theGerman language. For many decades it even became the definitive publication of progress in physics per se– alongside the Philosophical Magazine or the Comptes Rendus. In this Max Planck, by his authority andcompetency in science, specifically made a contribution that cannot be overstated. This period of Planck’sactivity also includes a calling into question of the Annalen’s unique position. The evolution in modernphysics and the shaping of modern periodical publishing after World War I made this role as primus interpares among physics journals slip away, as competitors like the Zeitschrift für Physik or The PhysicalReview entered the scene, challenged and ultimately eliminated its monopoly position. This developmentwas also furthered by the political developments in Germany after 1933, the expulsion by Nazi Germany ofmany reputable physicists, the catastrophic conditions in everyday life and research in post-war Germany,as well as, not least, the German schism and Cold War. The German language receded as the accepted idiomof physics and German journals generally lost their central place internationally. The half-century in whichMax Planck bore the responsibility for the Annalen marks a high point in another relation, too. For it wasstill possible for Max Planck and Wilhelm Wien to fulfill the editorial tasks largely on their own. Fromtoday’s viewpoint this means that judgments were often quite subjective and the admission or the rejectiona paper was sometimes in an authoritharian manner (“nach Gutsherrenart”). But this was quite typical of theperiod, not just for the editorial work of the Annalen. The same approach can be found with respect of theallocation of funds by the Notgemeinschaft or the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German ResearchFoundation) [158]. That this approach to editorial work, at least in Germany, was customary and broadlyaccepted in those days is highlighted by the astonishment of Albert Einstein, when confronted with a criticalreview of a paper he had submitted in 1935 to the Physical Review. In consequence, Einstein withdrew hispaper [159].

By the time of Planck’s death at the latest, this monopoly and style was also lost in Germany and theactivities of the editors increasingly demanded the involvement of scientific committees and advisory boardsand were incorporated in it – ultimately acquiring the modern peer review system as it was introduced alreadyin the 1930s in the USA. The final decade of Max Planck’s life and especially the irritations surroundingthe publication of the Sommerfeld special issue (and surely also of the Planck issue) in 1938 demonstratedthat even professional publishing was no longer possible but, like other supposedly unbiased institutions inscience, conformed to political currents.

Acknowledgements I thank Ann M. Hentschel (Stuttgart) for translating the German version of my paper as well asRuth Sime (Sacramento) and Mark Walker (Schenectady) for comments, Felix Ameseder (Berlin) for his assistance tocomplete the references and to create the figures of this paper, and Stefan L. Wolff (München) for helpful discussionsabout Wilhelm Wien.

References

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[2] L. Pyenson, The Young Einstein (Adam Hilger, Bristol, 1985), pp. 194–214, reprinted in Annalen der Physik17, 176–189 (2008).

[3] For more biographical information on Max Planck, see: J. Heilbron, The Dilemmas of an Upright Man (Universityof California Press, Berkeley, 1986); A. Hermann, Max Planck (Rowohlt-Verlag, Reinbek, 1973); D. Hoffmann,Max Planck. Die Entstehung der modernen Physik (Verlag C. H. Beck, Munich, 2008).

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[6] On Planck’s research on thermodynamics, see: M. Planck, Über thermodynamische Gleichgewichte, OstwaldsKlassiker der exakten Wissenschaften, vol. 299 edited by W. Ebeling and D. Hoffmann (Verlag Harri Deutsch,Frankfurt/Main, 2008).

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239; C. A. Gearhart, Planck, the Quantum, and the Historians, Phys. Perspect. 4, 170–215 (2002).[30] M. Planck, Zur Theorie der Wärmestrahlung, Annalen der Physik 31, 768 (1910) (PAV, vol. 2, pp. 237–247).[31] P. Debye, in an interview with T. S. Kuhn, 3 May 1962, Archive for the History of Quantum Physics.[32] D. Cassidy, Einstein and the Quantum Hypothesis, in: Einstein’s Annalen Papers, edited by J. Renn (Wiley-VCH,

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[36] D. K. Barkan, Walther Nernst and the transition to modern physical science (Cambridge University Press, Cam-bridge, 1998), pp. 181–207.



[37] Protokollbuch der Physikalischen Gesellschaft zu Berlin, Archiv der Deutschen Physikalischen Gesellschaft.[38] Feier des 80. Geburtstages des Ehrenmitgliedes der Deutschen Physikalischen Gesellschaft Herrn Geheimrat

Professor Dr. Max Planck, Verh. Dtsch. Phys. Ges. (West Germany) 19 (1938) 2, 61f.[39] R. Beyler, M. Eckert, and D. Hoffmann, Die Planck-Medaille, in: Physiker zwischen Autonomie und Anpassung.

Die Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft im Dritten Reich, edited by D. Hoffmann and M. Walker (Wiley-VCH,Weinheim, 2008), pp. 217–236.

[40] M. Planck, Die Theorie des Sättigungsgesetzes, Annalen der Physik 13, 535–543 (1881) (PAV, vol. 1, pp. 125–133).

[41] M. Planck, Versuch einer Synthese zwischen Wellenmechanik und Korpuskularmechanik, Annalen der Physik40, 481–492 (1941) (PAV, vol. 2, pp. 704–715 ).

[42] M. Planck, Physikalische Abhandlungen und Vorträge. 3 vol. (Friedr. Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig, 1958).[43] Exhibition leaflet: Annalen der Physik 1790–1990 (Deutsche Staatsbibliothek Berlin, April, 1990).[44] See also: Chr. Jungnickel and R. McCormmach, Intellectual Mastery of Nature, vol. 2 (University of Chicago

Press, Chicago, London, 1986), pp. 309–323; and recently St. L. Wolff, Kontrovers, aber kooperativ. Max Planckund Wilhelm Wien – eine Zusammenarbeit über Gegensätze hinweg, Phys. J. 7, 3, 51–55 (2008).

[45] For biographical information on Drude, see D. Hoffmann, Annalen der Physik 15, 449–460 (2006); P. Drude,Zur Elektronentheorie der Metalle, in: Ostwalds Klassiker der exakten Wissenschaften 298, edited by H. Grahnand D. Hoffmann (Verlag Harri Deutsch, Frankfurt am Main, 2006).

[46] M. Planck to Wilhelm Wien, Grunewald 21 Feb. 1910, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlinder Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[47] On W. Wien’s biography see H. Kangro, Wien, Wilhelm, in: Dictionary of Scientific Biography, vol. 13, editedby Ch. Gillespie (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1981), pp. 337–342; D. Hoffmann, Wilhelm Wien unddie Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt, Wiss. Fortschr. 39, 2, 29–30 (1989); St. L. Wolff, Physicists in the“Krieg der Geister”: Wilhelm Wien’s “proclamation”, Historical Studies Phys. Biol. Sci. 33, 337–368 (2003).

[48] M. Planck to W. Wien. Grunewald 15 Oct. 1906, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[49] M. Planck to W. Wien, Munich 21 Sep. 1906, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.


[51] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 12 Oct. 1906, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[52] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 28 Jul. 1906, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[53] L. Pyenson, The Young Einstein (Adam Hilger, Bristol, 1985), p. 198.[54] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 17 Apr. 1908, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[55] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 27 Feb. 1909, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[56] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 29 May 1917; 29 Jun. 1928, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek

zu Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[57] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 25 Mar. 1928, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[58] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald, 13 Jul. 1923, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[59] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald, 2 Mar. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[60] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 17 Apr. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[61] M. Planck to W. Wien, Axalp 25 Aug. 1908, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[62] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 24 Mar. 1924, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.



[63] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 25 Feb. 1922, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[64] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 30 Sep. 1909, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.


[66] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 1 Jul. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[67] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 25 Jan. 1925, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlinder Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[68] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 22 Jul. 1920, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlinder Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[69] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 21 Feb. 1910, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zuBerlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[70] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 1 Jun. 1910, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlinder Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[71] D. Hoffmann, Max Planck und die Physikalische Gesellschaft, Phys. J. 6(4) (2008) (in press).[72] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 20 Jul. 1920, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[73] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 1 Jul. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[74] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 5 Jan. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[75] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 29 Nov. 1906, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[76] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 5 Jan. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[77] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 30 Mar. 1925, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[78] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 1 Feb. 1922, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[79] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 19 May 1920, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[80] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 25 Jun. 1920, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[81] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 12 Dec. 1922, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[82] W. Wien to G. Quincke, undated draft, probably end of 1922, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek

zu Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[83] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 12 Jan. 1923, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[84] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 21 Oct. 1910, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu

Berlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[85] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 9 Feb. 1921, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[86] F. Kiebitz, Die vollständige Lösung der Differentialgleichungen zweier magnetisch gekoppelter, konstant

gedämpfter elektrischer Schwingungskreise, Annalen der Physik 40, 138–156 (1913).[87] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 9 Nov. 1922, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[88] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 19 Jun. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[89] G. Nordström, Träge und schwere Masse in der Relativitätsmechanik, Annalen der Physik 40, 856–878 (1913).[90] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 28 Jan. 1913, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.



[91] E. Gehrcke and O. Reichenheim, Interferenzen planparalleler Platten im kontinuierlichen Spektrum. Verh. Dtsch.Phys. Ges. (West Germany) 8, 209–221 (1906).

[92] M. Planck to W. Wien. Grunewald 1 Jul. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[93] E. Gehrcke and O. Reichenheim, Interferenzen planparalleler Platten im kontinuierlichen Spektrum, Annalender Physik 23, 745–757 (1907).

[94] M. Planck to W. Wien. Grunewald 1 Jul. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[95] W. Wien to M. Planck, Würzburg 21 Jun. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[96] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 23 Jun. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.


[98] W. Wien to M. Planck, Würzburg 16 Mar. 1916, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[99] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 11 Apr. 1916, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.



[102] W. Wien to M. Planck, Munich 15 Jan. 1928, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.


[104] S. Goldberg, Max Planck’s Philosophy of Nature and His Elaboration of the Special Theory of Relativity.Historical Studies Phys. Sci. 7, 125–160 (1976).

[105] D. Hoffmann, Max Planck als akademischer Lehrer, in: Die Entwicklung der Physik in Berlin, itw-Kolloquien35 (AdW der DDR, Berlin, 1984), pp. 55–72.

[106] K. von Mosengeil, Theorie der stationären Strahlung in einem gleichförmig bewegten Hohlraum, Annalen derPhysik 22, 867–904 (1907) (reprinted in PAV, vol. 2, pp. 138–175); cf. also the related exchange of letters betweenPlanck and Wien dated 26 Jan., 1 and 4 Feb. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[107] E. Hupka, Die träge Masse bewegter Elektronen, Dissertation, Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Berlin, 1909.[108] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 8 and 30 Nov. 1907, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[109] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 25 Apr. 1910, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[110] E. Hupka, Beitrag zur Kenntnis der trägen Masse bewegter Elektronen, Annalen der Physik 31, 169–204 (1910);

Zur Frage der trägen Masse bewegter Elektronen, Annalen der Physik 33, 400–402 (1911); W. Heil, Diskussionder Versuche über die träge Masse bewegter Elektronen, Annalen der Physik 31, 519–546 (1910); Zur Diskussionder Hupkaschen Versuche über die träge Masse bewegter Elektronen, Annalen der Physik 33, 403–404 (1911).



[113] H. Weyl, Zur Gravitationstheorie, Annalen der Physik 54, 117–145 (1917).[114] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 16 Sep. 1917, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[115] C. Lanczos, Flächenhafte Verteilung der Materie in der Einsteinschen Gravitationstheorie, Annalen der Physik

74, 518–540 (1924).[116] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 24 Mar. 1924, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der




[117] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 13 Oct. 1924, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zuBerlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.



[120] P. Hertz, Über die mechanischen Grundlagen der Thermodynamik, Annalen der Physik 33, 225–274 (1910);537–552.

[121] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 12 Jan. 1923, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlinder Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[122] K. Hentschel, Interpretationen und Fehlinterpretationen (Birkhäuser Verlag, Basel, 1990); S. Grundmann, TheEinstein Dossiers (Springer Verlag, Heidelberg, 2005).

[123] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 25 May 1925, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[124] W. Wien to M. Planck, Munich 16 Jan. 1928, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin derStiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[125] On the roles of E. Gehrcke and S. Mohorovic in the quarrels about relativity theory during the twenties, cf.M. Wazek, Einsteins Gegner, Dissertation, Philosophical faculty of the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 2008.

[126] E. Gehrcke to W. Wien. Berlin 4 May 1925. Archive of the Deutsches Museum, Munich, W. Wien’s papers,no. 5130.

[127] E. Schrödinger, Die Erfüllbarkeit der Relativitätsforderung in der klassischen Mechanik, Annalen der Physik77, 325–336 (1925).




[131] A. Hermann, Frühgeschichte der Quantentheorie (Physik Verlag, Mosbach, 1969), pp. 96ff.[132] A. Sommerfeld, Wissenschaftlicher Briefwechsel, vol. 1, edited by M. Eckert and K. Märker (GNT-Verlag,

Berlin, Diepholz, 2000), pp. 367ff.[133] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 27 Feb. 1911, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der


Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[135] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 9 Feb. 1911, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[136] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 14 Dec. 1913, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[137] A. E. Haas, Der erste Quantenansatz für das Atom, Dokumente der Naturwissenschaft, vol. 10, edited by A.

Hermann (Ernst Battenberg Verlag, Stuttgart, 1965).[138] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 8 May 1910, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[139] T. Wereide, Der Energieaustausch zwischen Materie und Äther, Annalen der Physik 49, 976–1000 (1916).[140] M. Planck to W. Wien, Grunewald 1 Mar. 1916, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der


Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[142] W. Wien to M. Planck, Mittenwald 3 Jan. 1925, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der

Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.[143] E. Schrödinger, Quantisierung als Eigenwertproblem, Annalen der Physik 79, 361–376, 489–527 (1926); An-

nalen der Physik 80, 437–490 (1926); Annalen der Physik 81, 109–129 (1926).[144] W. Wien to M. Planck, Munich 12 Feb. 1926, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin der




[145] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 19 Feb. 1926, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zuBerlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[146] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 6 Mar. 1926, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlinder Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[147] M. Planck to W. Wien, Berlin-Grunewald 22 Mar. 1926, Manuscripts department of the Staatsbibliothek zuBerlin der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Nachlaß Wilhelm Wien.

[148] Anniversary Speech of E. Grüneisens, on April 23rd, 1938. Verh. Dtsch. Phys. Ges. (West Germany) 19, 3, 61(1938) (PAV, vol. 3, p. 406)

[149] A. D. Beyerchen, Scientists under Hitler (Yale University Press, New Haven, London, 1977); K. Hentschel andA. Hentschel (eds.), Physics and National Socialism. An Anthology of Primary Sources (Birkhäuser Verlag,Basel, Boston, Berlin, 1996).

[150] G. Simonsohn, Die Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft und die Forschung, in: Physiker zwischen Autonomieund Anpassung. Die Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft im Dritten Reich, edited by D. Hoffmann andM. Walker (Wiley-VCH, Weinheim, 2008), pp. 265–269.

[151] Annalen der Physik 33, 564–688 (1938).[152] W. Pauli to W. Heisenberg, Zurich, 15 Aug 1938, in: W. Pauli, Wissenschaftlicher Briefwechsel mit Bohr,

Einstein, Heisenberg et al., edited by K. von Meyenn (Springer Verlag, Heidelberg, 1985), vol. 2, p. 593.[153] Phys. Rev. 54, 869–967 (1938).[154] Annalen der Physik 32, 1–224 (1938).[155] Annalen der Physik 32, 1 (1938).[156] E. Grüneisen, Anniversary Speech on 23 April 1938, Verh. Dtsch. Phys. Ges. (West Germany) 19, 3, 61 (1938)

(PAV, vol. 3, p. 406)[157] Annalen der Physik 42, 421 (1943).[158] Remarks during the discussion of the final conference about the History of the DFG, Berlin January 30th, 2008,

see: Gutsherren, Menschen, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 5. 2. 2008, p. 25.[159] D. Kennefick, Einstein versus The Physical Review, Physics Today 58 (9), 43–48 (2005).


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