Aimée Antoinette Camus (1 May 1879 – 17 April 1965) was a French

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

. She was best known for her study of

orchids Orchids are plants that belong to the family Orchidaceae (), a diverse and widespread group of flowering plants with blooms that are often colourful and fragrant. Along with the Asteraceae, they are one of the two largest families of flowering ...

and

oak An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...

s. Camus also has the legacy of authoring the second highest number of land plant species among female scientists, in total naming 677 species. Camus was the daughter of

Edmond Gustave Camus Edmond Gustave Camus (1852 – 22 August 1915) was a French pharmacist and botanist known for his work with orchids. A pharmacist by vocation, he was a resident of L'Isle-Adam, a community near Paris. He was the father of botanist Aimée Antoine ...

, also a botanist, and was born in L'Isle-Adam, about 50 kilometres north of

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

. Under her father's influence she specialized in the study of orchids and the anatomy of the plant and worked for some time with other professionals such as

Paul Bergon Louis-Jacques-Paul Bergon (27 September 1863 in Paris – 27 January 1912) was a French photographer, musician and naturalist. He was a nephew of photographer René Le Bègue (1857–1914). Son of a banker, he was introduced to photography by membe ...

(1863-1912) and

Paul Henri Lecomte Paul Henri Lecomte (8 January 1856, in Saint-Nabord, Vosges – 12 June 1934, in Paris) was a French botanist. In 1884, after attaining a number of degrees, Lecomte became a professor at Lycée Saint-Louis in Paris. In addition to his teaching dut ...

(1856-1934). Her sister was the painter Blanche-Augustine Camus (1881-1968).Female Artists in History: Blanche Augustine Camus (French painter)
/ref> She also produced a major treatment of the oaks and stone oaks, providing the first comprehensive systematic treatment of the latter genus. Camus published the work ''L'Iconographie des Orchidées d´Europe et du Bassin Méditerranéen''. She gave the name of ''

Neohouzeaua ''Neohouzeaua'' is a genus of Asian bamboo within the Poaceae, grass family).bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of evergreen perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family. The origin of the word "bamboo" is uncertain, bu ...

, in honour of the lifelong work that Jean Houzeau de Lehaie had devoted to the understanding of the botany and propagation of bamboo in Europe and Africa.

References

20th-century French botanists Orchidologists 1879 births 1965 deaths 20th-century French women scientists Agrostologists {{France-botanist-stub