1917 deaths

Karl Mellinger (26 November 1858, in Mainz – 21 May 1917, in Basel) was a German-Swiss ophthalmologist.
Mellinger studied medicine at the universities of Zürich and Basel until 1883, and afterwards worked as an assistant to ophthalmologists Johann Friedrich Horner in Zürich and Karl Stellwag von Carion at the University of Vienna. In 1889 he obtained his habilitation at Basel and was named head of the outpatient clinic. In 1896 he became an associate professor and successor to Heinrich Schiess-Gemuseus as head of the university eye clinic. Among his students and assistants at Basel were Alfred Vogt and August Siegrist. He is credited with introducing a specialized ring magnet (inner pole eye magnet) into ophthalmology.

François-Bérenger Saunière (11 April 1852 – 22 January 1917) was a French Catholic priest in the village of Rennes-le-Château, in the Aude region. He was a central figure in the conspiracy theories surrounding the village, which form the basis of several documentaries and books such as the 1982 Holy Blood, Holy Grail by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln. Elements of these theories were later used by Dan Brown in his best-selling 2003 novel The Da Vinci Code, in which the fictional character Jacques Saunière is named after the priest.Saunière served in Rennes-le-Château from 1885 until he was transferred to another village in 1909 by his bishop. He declined this nomination and subsequently resigned. From 1909 until his death in 1917, he was a non-stipendiary Free Priest (an independent priest without a parish, who did not receive any salary from the church because of suspension), and who from 1910 celebrated Mass at an altar constructed in a special conservatory by his Villa Bethania. Saunière's refusal to leave Rennes-le-Château to continue his priesthood in another parish incurred permanent suspension. The epitaph on Saunière's original 1917 gravestone read "priest of Rennes-le-Château 1885-1917".

Louis Théophile Joseph Landouzy (27 March 1845 – 10 May 1917) was a French neurologist from Reims, and whose father and grandfather were also physicians.
He studied medicine in Reims and Paris, earning his doctorate in 1876. He spent much his career at the University of Paris, becoming a professor of therapy in 1893 and a dean of medicine in 1901.
His name is associated with the "Landouzy-Dejerine syndrome", a type of muscular dystrophy with atrophic changes to the facial muscles and scapulo-humeral region. It is named along with neurologist Joseph Jules Dejerine, who was a colleague and close friend. Landouzy was a witness at the wedding of Dejerine to Augusta Marie Klumpke (1859–1927) in 1888.
Landouzy's primary area of interest dealt with tuberculosis, and he was a major figure involving education of the public for its eradication. He was a member of several international committees in regards to tuberculosis.
He is credited with coining the word "camptodactyly" to describe a flexion deformity of the finger(s) at the proximal interphalangeal joint (1906). With neurologist Joseph Grasset (1849–1918), his name is associated with the "Landouzy-Grasset Law". This law states that in lesions concerning one hemisphere of the brain, a patient will turn his head to the side of affected muscles if there is spasticity, and to the side of the cerebral lesion if there is paralysis.

Gustav Jäger (June 23, 1832 – May 13, 1917) was a German naturalist and hygienist.

François Cyrille Grand'Eury (9 March 1839, Houdreville – 22 July 1917, Malzéville) was a French geologist, paleontologist and mathematics teacher.
He studied at the École Loritz in Nancy and at the École des mines in Saint-Étienne, and later worked as a mining engineer in Roche-la-Molière. From 1863 to 1899 he taught classes in mathematics at the École des mines in Saint-Étienne, where in 1883 he received the title of professor.From 1877 he was a member of the Société géologique de France and in 1885 was elected a correspondent member of the Académie des Sciences.He is remembered for his stratigraphic research of coal fields and for his investigations involving the formation of coal. He is credited with establishing the chronological succession of floras associated with the coal seams of the Stephanian stage (named after the development of this stage at Saint-Étienne). He conducted exhaustive studies of coal flora (Cordaites, Calamites, et al), and in 1877 described the genus Tubiculites.

Julian Leopold Ochorowicz (Polish pronunciation: ['juljan lɛˈɔpɔld ɔxɔˈrɔvit͡ʂ]; outside Poland also known as Julien Ochorowitz; Radzymin, 23 February 1850 – 1 May 1917, Warsaw) was a Polish philosopher, psychologist, inventor (precursor of radio and television), poet, publicist, and leading exponent of Polish Positivism.

Jean-Baptiste "Auguste" Chauveau ForMemRS (23 November 1827 – 4 January 1917) was a French professor and veterinarian.

Charles Eugène Bertrand (2 January 1851, in Paris – 18 August 1917) was a French botanist, paleobotanist and geologist. He is remembered for his research involving the formation of coal.
He studied sciences in Paris, where he had as influences botanist Joseph Decaisne and plant physiologist Pierre Paul Deherain. In 1874 he obtained his doctorate in sciences, and was later appointed professor of botany at the University of Lille (1878). From 1881 to 1887, he was head of the Archives botaniques du nord de la France.In 1878 he became a member of the Société botanique de France. He was the father of botanist Paul Charles Édouard Bertrand (1879-1944).

Henri-Émile Bazin (10 January 1829 – 7 February 1917), also known as Henry Bazin, was a French engineer specializing in hydraulic engineering, and whose main contributions relate to the systematic study of free surface flows and the measurement of flows (gauging).

Élodie La Villette, born Elodie Jacquier (April 12, 1848 Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin) – 1917 Saint-Pierre-Quiberon), was a French painter. She is said to be one of the few women to have an artistic career when many routes were denied to them.