Eduard August von Regel (sometimes Edward von Regel or Edward de Regel or Édouard von Regel), Russian: Эдуард Август Фон Регель; (born 13 August 1815 in
Gotha
Gotha () is the fifth-largest city in Thuringia, Germany, west of Erfurt and east of Eisenach with a population of 44,000. The city is the capital of the district of Gotha and was also a residence of the Ernestine Wettins from 1640 until the ...
; died 15 April 1892 in
St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
) was a German
horticulturalist
Horticulture is the branch of agriculture that deals with the art, science, technology, and business of plant cultivation. It includes the cultivation of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, herbs, sprouts, mushrooms, algae, flowers, seaweeds and no ...
and
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 ...
. He ended his career serving as the Director of the
Russian Imperial Botanical Garden of St. Petersburg. As a result of
naturalists and explorers sending back biological collections, Regel was able to describe and name many previously unknown species from frontiers around the world.
History
Regel was the son of the teacher and garrison-preacher Ludwig A. Regel. Already as a child he liked growing fruits and learnt to prune apple trees from a gardener of his grandfather Döring and cultivated the garden of his parents. He visited the
Gymnasium at Gotha but left without
Abitur
''Abitur'' (), often shortened colloquially to ''Abi'', is a qualification granted at the end of secondary education in Germany. It is conferred on students who pass their final exams at the end of ISCED 3, usually after twelve or thirteen year ...
Regel earned a degree from the
University of Bonn
The Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (german: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) is a public research university located in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the ( en, Rhine U ...
.
At 15, Regel began his career as an apprentice at the
Royal Garden Limonaia in Gotha in 1830-1833 and in spring 1833 went as an adjunct to the
botanical garden
A botanical garden or botanic gardenThe terms ''botanic'' and ''botanical'' and ''garden'' or ''gardens'' are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word ''botanic'' is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens, an ...
in
Göttingen
Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...
. He then worked in the botanical gardens in
Bonn
The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr r ...
(1837-1839) and Berlin (1839-1842). In 1842 he moved to Switzerland to become the head of the
Old Botanical Garden, Zürich
The Old Botanical Garden (German: ''Alter Botanischer Garten'') is a botanical garden and arboretum in the Swiss city of Zürich. The garden is, among the neighbored '' Schanzengraben'' moat and the ''Bauschänzli'' bastion, one of the last remains ...
. During this time he also worked as a lecturer of science. In 1852 he founded the magazine ''
Gartenflora
''Gartenflora'' was a German illustrated botanical magazine published in the period 1852–1940.
History
Founded in 1852 and edited by Eduard von Regel, the botanist and future director of the Saint Petersburg Botanical Garden, the magazine ap ...
'' (Garden Flora), in which he described many new species.
In 1855 Regel moved to St. Petersburg, Russia, where he initially worked as a research director and later as senior botanist at the
Imperial Botanical Garden. From 1875 until his death he served as the director of the Imperial Botanical Garden. While there, he oversaw the creation of some of the gardens (e.g. the Admiralty garden) and the facility laboratory. He was a founder and vice-president of the
Russian Gardening Society and a number of
academic journal
An academic journal or scholarly journal is a periodical publication in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as permanent and transparent forums for the presentation, scrutiny, and d ...
s.
In 1875, he became an associate member of the
St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. Volume 111 of ''
Curtis's Botanical Magazine
''The Botanical Magazine; or Flower-Garden Displayed'', is an illustrated publication which began in 1787. The longest running botanical magazine, it is widely referred to by the subsequent name ''Curtis's Botanical Magazine''.
Each of the issue ...
'' is dedicated to him.
Regel died in St. Petersburg in 1892 and was buried at the
Smolenskoe Lutheran Cemetery.
Plants named by him
Regel described and named over 3000 plant species. Many of the plants he named were from the
Russian Far East
The Russian Far East (russian: Дальний Восток России, r=Dal'niy Vostok Rossii, p=ˈdalʲnʲɪj vɐˈstok rɐˈsʲiɪ) is a region in Northeast Asia. It is the easternmost part of Russia and the Asian continent; and is admini ...
and Asia as
Russian Geographical Society expeditions where active in this area during his tenure at the Imperial Botanical Gardens in St. Petersburg.
Plants named for him
In 1843,
J. C. Schauer named the genus ''
Regelia
''Regelia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Myrtaceae and is endemic to the south-west of Western Australia. The genus is composed of five species of small leaved, evergreen shrubs which have heads of flowers on the ends of bran ...
'' in honor of Regel. It is a group of flowering plants in the family
Myrtaceae
Myrtaceae, the myrtle family, is a family of dicotyledonous plants placed within the order Myrtales. Myrtle, pōhutukawa, bay rum tree, clove, guava, acca (feijoa), allspice, and eucalyptus are some notable members of this group. All speci ...
which are
endemic
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...
to the southwest
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
. In 1854,
Planchon named the
cestrum
''Cestrum'' is a genus of — depending on authority — 150-250 species of flowering plants in the family Solanaceae. They are native to warm temperate to tropical regions of the Americas, from the southernmost United States (Florida, Texas: day ...
species ''
Cestrum regelii
''Cestrum'' is a genus of — depending on authority — 150-250 species of flowering plants in the family Solanaceae. They are native to warm temperate to tropical regions of the Americas, from the southernmost United States (Florida, Texas: day ...
'' after him,
Robert Lynch in 1904 a subsection of ''
Iris
Iris most often refers to:
*Iris (anatomy), part of the eye
*Iris (mythology), a Greek goddess
* ''Iris'' (plant), a genus of flowering plants
* Iris (color), an ambiguous color term
Iris or IRIS may also refer to:
Arts and media
Fictional ent ...
'' and
''
Iljinia regelii''
(Bunge) Korovin ex Iljin is also named in his honour.
Publications
Regel was an extremely prolific scientist and author. In addition to writing a number of major reference works in botany, he published 3101 articles in academic journals.
[Eduard von Regel]
in the St. Petersburg Encyclopedia. S. V. Boglachev.
Selected publications
Cultur der Pflanzen unserer höheren Gebirge sowie des hohen Nordens Erlangen 1856
* Allgemeines Gartenbuch (General garden book) 2 Vols., Zurich 1855, 1868
* Monographia Betulacearum (in: Nouveaux Mémoires de la Société Impériale des Naturalistes de Moscou 13: 59-187, 1861)
* Tentamen florae ussuriensis (Tentamen flora of the Ussuri River Region), 1861
*
Tentamen rosarum monographiae(Monograph of Roses), 1877
*
*
Associates
*
Richard Maack
Richard Otto Maack (also Richard Karlovic Maak, Russian: Ричард Карлович Маак; 4 September 1825 – 25 November 1886) was a 19th-century Russian naturalist, geographer, and anthropologist. He is most known for his explorat ...
Russian botanist, co-author, naturalist, and Siberian explorer.
*
Johann Albert von Regel Johann Albert von Regel in Russian: Иоанн-Альберт Регель (12 December 1845, Zürich – 6 July 1908, Odessa) was a Swiss-Russian physician and botanist. He was the son of botanist Eduard August von Regel (1815-1892).
He studied ...
(1845–1908; oldest son) Swiss born Russian Physician, botanist, traveler.
CRC World Dictionary of Plant Names
1964 By Umberto Quattrocchi p. 79.
*Constantin Andreas von Regel
Constantin Andreas von Regel ( lt, Konstantinas Regelis; 10 August 1890, in Saint Petersburg – 22 May 1970, in Zürich) was a Russian and Lithuanian horticulturalist and botanist. He was a grandson of Eduard August von Regel.
In 1922 he was nam ...
(1890–1970; grandson) Russian and Lithuanian horticulturalist and botanist.
References
External links
Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie
{{DEFAULTSORT:Regel, Eduard August von
1815 births
1892 deaths
People from Gotha (town)
People from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
19th-century German botanists
Corresponding members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences
Privy Councillor (Russian Empire)