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Anton Reichenow (1 August 1847 in
The Birds: Handbook of Systematic Ornithology. Volume 1
The Birds: Handbook of Systematic Ornithology. Volume 2
The Birds of German-East-Africa (1894)
''Die Vögel Afrikas''. Volume 1Volume 2Volume 3Atlas
''Conspectus Psittacorum''
1847 births 1941 deaths German ornithologists People from Charlottenburg Journal of Ornithology editors {{ornithologist-stub
Anton Reichenow (1 August 1847 in Charlottenburg
Charlottenburg () is a locality of Berlin within the borough of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf. Established as a town in 1705 and named after Sophia Charlotte of Hanover, Queen consort of Prussia, it is best known for Charlottenburg Palace, the ...
– 6 July 1941 in Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
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) was a German ornithologist and herpetologist
Herpetology (from Greek ἑρπετόν ''herpetón'', meaning "reptile" or "creeping animal") is the branch of zoology concerned with the study of amphibians (including frogs, toads, salamanders, newts, and caecilians ( gymnophiona)) and rep ...
.
Reichenow was the son-in-law of Jean Cabanis
Jean Louis Cabanis (8 March 1816 – 20 February 1906) was a German ornithologist.
Cabanis was born in Berlin to an old Huguenot family who had moved from France. Little is known of his early life. He studied at the University of Berlin from 1 ...
, and worked at the Natural History Museum of Berlin from 1874 to 1921. He was an expert on Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
n bird
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweig ...
s, making a collecting expedition to West Africa
West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, M ...
in 1872 and 1873, and writing ''Die Vögel Afrikas'' (1900–05). He was also an expert on parrots, describing all species then known in his book ''Vogelbilder aus Fernen Zonen: Abbildungen und Beschreibungen der Papageien'' (illustrated by Gustav Mützel, 1839–1893). He also wrote ''Die Vögel der Bismarckinseln'' (1899). He was editor of the ''Journal für Ornithologie
The ''Journal of Ornithology'' (formerly ''Journal für Ornithologie'') is a scientific journal published by Springer Science+Business Media on behalf of the Deutsche Ornithologen-Gesellschaft. It was founded by Jean Cabanis in 1853, becoming the o ...
'' from 1894 to 1921.
A number of birds are named after him, including Reichenow's woodpecker
The speckle-throated woodpecker (''Campethera scriptoricauda''), also known as Reichenow's woodpecker, is an East African woodpecker often considered a subspecies of Bennett's woodpecker. The bird is named after the German ornithologist Anton Rei ...
and Reichenow's firefinch. His son Eduard Reichenow
Johann Eduard Reichenow (7 July 1883 – 23 March 1960) was a German protozoologist. He was the son of ornithologist Anton Reichenow.
Biography
Reichenow was born in Berlin. He studied natural sciences in Heidelberg, Berlin and Munich, and ...
was a famous protozoologist Protozoology is the study of protozoa, the "animal-like" (i.e., motile and heterotrophic) protists. The Protozoa are considered to be a subkingdom of Protista. They are free-living organisms that are found in almost every habitat. All humans have pr ...
.
Reichenow is known for his classification of birds into six groups, described as "shortwings, swimmers, stiltbirds, skinbills, yoketoes, and treebirds". This system was not adopted by any other ornithologists, but is used in the Dewey Decimal System.
Reichenow also worked in the scientific field of herpetology. He is credited with describing a new genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...
and two new species
In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...
of frogs, and two new species of lizards. He is commemorated in the scientific name
In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...
of a species of skink, '' Lacertaspis reichenowi''.Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). ''The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. . ("Reichenow", pp. 218-219).
References
Further reading
* Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael (2003). ''Whose Bird? Men and Women Commemorated in the Common Names of Birds''. London: Christopher Helm. * Walters, Michael (2003). ''A Concise History of Ornithology''. New Haven: Yale University Press. .External links
The Birds: Handbook of Systematic Ornithology. Volume 1
The Birds: Handbook of Systematic Ornithology. Volume 2
The Birds of German-East-Africa (1894)
''Die Vögel Afrikas''. Volume 1
''Conspectus Psittacorum''
1847 births 1941 deaths German ornithologists People from Charlottenburg Journal of Ornithology editors {{ornithologist-stub