Achille Valenciennes (9 August 1794 – 13 April 1865) was a French

zoologist Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and d ...

. Valenciennes was born in

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 ...

, and studied under

Georges Cuvier Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric, Baron Cuvier (; 23 August 1769 – 13 May 1832), known as Georges Cuvier, was a French natural history, naturalist and zoology, zoologist, sometimes referred to as the "founding father of paleontology". Cuvier ...

. His study of parasitic worms in humans made an important contribution to the study of parasitology. He also carried out diverse systematic classifications, linking fossil and current

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 ...

. He worked with Cuvier on the 22-volume "'' Histoire Naturelle des Poissons''" (Natural History of Fish) (1828–1848), carrying on alone after Cuvier died in 1832. In 1832, he succeeded

Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville (; 12 September 1777 – 1 May 1850) was a French zoologist and anatomist. Life Blainville was born at Arques, near Dieppe. As a young man he went to Paris to study art, but ultimately devoted himself to natur ...

(1777–1850) as chair of ''Histoire naturelle des mollusques, des vers et des zoophytes'' at the

Muséum national d'histoire naturelle The French National Museum of Natural History, known in French as the ' (abbreviation MNHN), is the national natural history museum of France and a ' of higher education part of Sorbonne Universities. The main museum, with four galleries, is loc ...

. Early in his career, he was given the task of classifying animals described by

Alexander von Humboldt Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt (14 September 17696 May 1859) was a German polymath, geographer, naturalist, explorer, and proponent of Romantic philosophy and science. He was the younger brother of the Prussian minister, ...

(1769–1859) during his travels in the American tropics (1799 to 1803), and a lasting friendship was established between the two men. He is the binomial authority for many species of fish, such as the bartail jawfish. Working in the scientific field of herpetology, Valenciennes described two new species of reptiles. The

organ of Valenciennes The organ of Valenciennes, named after the French naturalist Achille Valenciennes, is one of two secondary sexual organs of the female of the genus ''Nautilus The nautilus (, ) is a pelagic marine mollusc of the cephalopod family Nautilidae. The ...

, a part of the anatomy of a female of the genus ''

Nautilus The nautilus (, ) is a pelagic marine mollusc of the cephalopod family Nautilidae. The nautilus is the sole extant family of the superfamily Nautilaceae and of its smaller but near equal suborder, Nautilina. It comprises six living species in ...

'', the purpose of which remains unknown, is named after him. A species of lizard, '' Anolis valencienni'', is named after him.Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). ''The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. . ("Valenciennes", p. 271).

References

1794 births 1865 deaths 19th-century French zoologists French zoologists French taxonomists French ichthyologists French herpetologists French parasitologists Members of the French Academy of Sciences National Museum of Natural History (France) people {{France-zoologist-stub

See also

References