Sigmund Freud was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst. He was born in 1856 in Freiberg, which is now part of the Czech Republic, and studied medicine at the University of Vienna. Freud's work focused on the unconscious mind and the idea that psychological problems arise from unresolved conflicts and repressed emotions from childhood experiences.