< 2650 BC-1542
16'th century, when the known world expanded, many new plants
were brought to the botanists. There were
published many publications on plants during those years, but most
authors were far more interested in the medicinal properties of individual
plants, than an overarching classification system. There were a few
exceptions, and in the late 16'th century and in the 17'th century,
the first true systems were published.
Andrea Cesalpino (Andreas
Caesalpinus) (1519–1603) based his system on
the structure of the organs of fructification, using the Aristotelian
technique of logical division, published in De plantis libri XVI,
1583 with 1520 plants. His main groups are herbal and woody, but he uses the
flowers and fruits for lover classes. Make the concept of genera.
He was one of the first botanists to make a herbarium. He made one for
Bishop Alfonso Tornabono in 1550-60. It contains 768 varieties of plants,
and it still exists!
Andrea Cesalpino was born in the
Italian town Arezzo, Tuscany. He was a physician, philosopher and botanist,
and in 1555, he became the director of the botanic garden in Pisa.
The family Caesalpinioideae is
named in his honour.
by their fruit typos. Event the term Genera. Made a herbarium.
|| Johannes Bodaeus van
Stapel (Stapel) (1602-1632) took Theophrastus work a step further, with added
commentaries and drawings, and it was copied the following hundreds of
years. Besides from that, there were no innovative ideas in his work.
Honoured in the genus
Bodaeus van Stapel was born in Amsterdam. He worked as a physician and
botanist. His illustrated Historia Plantarum was based on
Theophrastus work, with a lot of comments, and counted 1187 pages. It was
published by his father, after his dead, in 1644.
Drawings and comments.
Frontispiece to the original 1644 version.
(Gaspard ) (1560–1624) described
over 6000 plants in Pinax theatri botanici, 1623, which were 12 books
with 72 sections based on a
wide range of common characteristics. The classification system was not
particularly innovative, using traditional groups such as "trees", "shrubs",
and "herbs", and using other characteristics such utilization, for instance
grouping spices into the Aromata. He did correctly group grasses, legumes,
and several others.
His most important contribution is in the description of
genera and species. He introduced many names of genera that were later
adopted by Carl Linnaeus, and remain in use.
For species, he carefully pruned
the descriptions down to as few words as possible; in many cases a single
word sufficed as description, thus giving the appearance of a two-part name.
However, the single-word description was still a description intended to be
diagnostic, not an arbitrarily-chosen name. This might very well have been
the inspiration for Carl Linnaeus to event the binomial nomenclature.
Later cameTheatrum Botanicum
in 1658, but only one out of twelve volumes were published. Two more were
written, but newer made it to the printer.
Caspar Bauhin was a Swiss
botanist, who was born in Basel, and studied medicine at Padua, Montpellier,
and in Germany. He was appointed to a Greek professorship, the chair of
anatomy and botany, city physician, professor of the practice of medicine,
rector of the university, and dean of his faculty.
The Bauhinia is named after him
and his brother; Johann Bauhin, an other botanist.
| Still: Tree,
shrubs or herbs.
into genera and species. Many genera still in use. Correct groups on grasses,
legumes, and several others. Shorter names.
In the late 16'th and the 17'th century, the most
influential classification schemes were made by John Ray,
Augustus Quirinus Rivinus and Joseph Pitton
de Tournefort. The amount of plants available from herbariums
explodes, and a simple but effective system was critical. Andrea Cesalpino
idea of dividing by fruits open up for more detailed systems, than just
"tree, shrub and herb".
John Ray (1627-1705) (Wray) listed over 18,000 plant species in his works,
the first: Catalogus plantarum circa Cantabrigiam nascentium
The 626 plants are listed alphabetically, but a system of classification
differing little from Caspar Bauhin's is sketched at the end of the book. In
1670 came Catalogus plantarum Angliae et insularum adjacentium. In
1674, the paper A Discourse on the Seeds of Plants, distinguished
between plants with a single seed leaf and those with two such leaves, and he
established the monocot/dicot division (probatly after having read Albertus
Magnus (se above). Later same year, he laid down the
definition of a species in terms of the structural qualities alone. This is
followed up in Methodus plantarum nova 1682 and Historia generalis
plantarum in 1686, 1688 and 1704, which described about 6,100 species.
Some of his subgroups like
mustards, mints, legumes and grasses stand today although their names have
been changed (he probably also read Caspar Bauhin (se above)). He was the first to use species as the fundamental unit of
John Ray was an English naturalist,
born in Black Notley, near Braintree, in the county of Essex.
first monocot and dicot division with that name. First to use species as the fundamental
unit of classification.
The first systems:
Robert Morison (1620-1683), the
first professor of botany at Oxford, published a systematic arrangement of
plants (largely on the lines previously suggested by Caesalpinus in 1583) in
his Historia Plantarum Oxoniensis, 1670. He divided them into
eighteen classes, distinguishing plants according as they were woody or
herbaceous, and taking into account the nature of the flowers and fruit. In
1672 came Plantarum Umbelliferarum Distributio Nova, per tabulas
cognationis et afflnitatis, ex libro Naturae observata et delecta, Oxon.
He continued working till his suddenly death (run over by a carriage) and
that left only nine of the fifteen classes of his own system finished.
Robert Morison was born in
Aberdeen, Scotland. He took the the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in 1638
in Aberdeen. In 1648, he took a doctor’s degree in Physic at Angers, and in
1650, he became intendant of the ducal gardens at Blois. When he returned to
England, he became the king’s physician, and was appointed royal
professor of Botany. He was elected the first botanic professor at the
university of Oxford.
into 18/15 classes.
From Historia Plantarum Oxoniensis.
Pierre Magnol (1638-1715) grouped plants
into 76 families in his publication Prodromus historiae generalis, in
qua familiae pertabulas disponutur from 1689. He is the first
to use the concept of Family, and he used a combination of morphological
was born in Montpellier, France. He became Professor of Botany and
Director of the Royal Botanic Garden of Montpellier, and was the first to
publish the concept of plant families as we know them, a natural
classification, in which groups of plant with associated common features
He is honoured in the Magnolia
genus and Division.
Concept of plant families.
Augustus Quirinus Rivinus (1652–1723)
(August Bachmann) classified plants based on the characters of the flower,
and introduced the category of order in Introductio generalis in rem
herbariam in 1690. Same year came Ordo Plantarum qvae sunt Flore
Irregulari Monopetalo. He was the first to abolish the ancient division of
plants into herbs and trees and insisted that the true method of division
should be based on the parts of the fructification alone.
His way of grouping into
Genus summum, was later adopted partly by i.e. Tournefort and Linnaeus.
Augustus Quirinus Rivinus was born in
Leipzig, Germany. He studied in Leipzig and Helmstad, and got his M.D. in
1676. In 1691, he became the curator of the Leipzig University medical
plants by their flowers. Introduced the category of order.
University of Helmstedt in the
groups: Genus summum
< 2650 BC-1542