Elias Tillandz (1640–1693; born Tillander) was a Swedish-born

doctor Doctor or The Doctor may refer to: Personal titles * Doctor (title), the holder of an accredited academic degree * A medical practitioner, including: ** Physician ** Surgeon ** Dentist ** Veterinary physician ** Optometrist *Other roles ** ...

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 ...

who worked in Finland. He was the professor of medicine at the Academy of Turku. He wrote the country's first botanical work, the '' Catalogus Plantarum'', which was first published in 1673. As a doctor he also prepared medicines for his patients by using his extensive knowledge of plants. According to legend, Tillandz (''Till lands'' means ''by land'' in

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

) changed his name from Tillander to Tillandz when, as a student, he travelled by boat from

Turku Turku ( ; ; sv, Åbo, ) is a city and former capital on the southwest coast of Finland at the mouth of the Aura River, in the region of Finland Proper (''Varsinais-Suomi'') and the former Turku and Pori Province (''Turun ja Porin lääni''; ...

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

. On the way, he became so seasick that he returned by walking around the

Gulf of Bothnia The Gulf of Bothnia (; fi, Pohjanlahti; sv, Bottniska viken) is divided into the Bothnian Bay and Bothnian Sea, and it is the northernmost arm of the Baltic Sea, between Finland's west coast ( East Bothnia) and the Sweden's east coast (West ...

, a distance of some 1000 kilometers. A genus of

epiphytic An epiphyte is an organism that grows on the surface of a plant and derives its moisture and nutrients from the air, rain, water (in marine environments) or from debris accumulating around it. The plants on which epiphytes grow are called phoroph ...

plants, ''

Tillandsia ''Tillandsia'' is a genus of around 650 species of evergreen, perennial flowering plants in the family Bromeliaceae, native to the forests, mountains and deserts of northern Mexico and south-eastern United States, Mesoamerica and the Caribbean to ...

'', was named after Tillandz by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

. This botanist is denoted by the author abbreviation Tillandz when citing a

botanical name A botanical name is a formal scientific name conforming to the '' International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants'' (ICN) and, if it concerns a plant cultigen, the additional cultivar or Group epithets must conform to the ''Intern ...

External links

Elias Tillandz (1640–1693)

Finlands minnesvärde män, band 1
1853-1854, s.161-171
Ruoff, E. Til-Landz, Elias (1640–1693)

Ruoff, E. Tillandz, Elias (1640–1693

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tillandz, Elias Botanists with author abbreviations 1640 births 1693 deaths Pre-Linnaean botanists