Gilles de la Tourette was potentially successor to Charcot as Professor of Neurology. According to Charcot it was a specific neurological disease which he named after his pupil: la maladie des tics de Gilles de la Tourette. In 1885 Gilles de la Tourette published a paper on a rare disorder whose symptoms were sudden movements (tics) and the shouting out of obscene language (coprolalia).

To provide an historical overview of the different views about the disease of Gilles de la Tourette and the Tourette Syndrome. Description of the life, illness and work of Georges Gilles de la Tourette (1857-1904) and the history of his eponym.