Franz Wilhelm Sieber (30 March 1789 – 17 December 1844), was a

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 ...

and collector who travelled to

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

, the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...

Southern Africa Southern Africa is the southernmost subregion of the African continent, south of the Congo and Tanzania. The physical location is the large part of Africa to the south of the extensive Congo River basin. Southern Africa is home to a number of ...

and

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 ...

Early life

Franz Sieber was born in

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

Bohemia Bohemia ( ; cs, Čechy ; ; hsb, Čěska; szl, Czechy) is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech Republic. Bohemia can also refer to a wider area consisting of the historical Lands of the Bohemian Crown ruled by the Bohem ...

on 30 March 1789. After 5 years of study at the Gymnasium, endowed with a considerable talent for the graphic arts, he studied architecture, switched to engineering and finally settled on natural history, in particular botany.

Expeditions

He made several collecting trips to

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

Crete Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, and ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

and

Palestine __NOTOC__ Palestine may refer to: * State of Palestine, a state in Western Asia * Palestine (region), a geographic region in Western Asia * Palestinian territories, territories occupied by Israel since 1967, namely the West Bank (including East ...

followed by a two-year-long expedition to Australia,

Mauritius Mauritius ( ; french: Maurice, link=no ; mfe, label=Mauritian Creole, Moris ), officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It incl ...

and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

, collecting not only plants, but also animals, art and ethnographic objects. He spent seven months in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

(then more usually called

Port Jackson Port Jackson, consisting of the waters of Sydney Harbour, Middle Harbour, North Harbour and the Lane Cove and Parramatta Rivers, is the ria or natural harbour of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The harbour is an inlet of the Tasman Sea (p ...

) from 1 June 1823 until December 1823 where he collected 645 local plant specimens. He never reached the Western hemisphere (in contradistinction to Friedrich Wilhelm Sieber, an employee of

Johann Centurius Hoffmannsegg Johann Centurius Hoffmann Graf von Hoffmannsegg (23 August 1766 – 13 December 1849) was a German botanist, entomologist and ornithologist. Hoffmannsegg was born at Rammenau and studied at Leipzig and Göttingen. He travelled through Europe a ...

), but sent several people to make collections for him, notably

Franz Kohaut Franz Kohaut (died 1822) was a Czech botanical collector and gardener from Neuhaus, Bohemia. In 1816–18 he accompanied botanist Franz Wilhelm Sieber (1789–1844) on an expedition to Crete, Egypt and Palestine, and afterwards worked for Sieber ...

in the

Antilles The Antilles (; gcf, label=Antillean Creole, Antiy; es, Antillas; french: Antilles; nl, Antillen; ht, Antiy; pap, Antias; Jamaican Patois: ''Antiliiz'') is an archipelago bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the south and west, the Gulf of Mex ...

and

Wenceslas Bojer Wenceslas Bojer (also Václav Bojer in Czech or Wenzel Bojer in German) (23 September 1795 in Řesanice, Bohemia, now the Czech Republic – 4 June 1856 in Port Louis, Mauritius) was a Czech naturalist, botanist and botanical illustrator. Lif ...

on Mauritius.

Later life and death

His behavior and publications became progressively more erratic. He was constantly involved in quarrels with the authorities and rapidly became more and more deranged. Having “discovered” a cure for rabies he appeared in front of the city elders of Prague and demanded financial support. Soon thereafter he landed in the Prague insane asylum, where he spent the fourteen final years of his life, dying there at the age of fifty-five.

Legacy

He is commemorated in the genus '' Siebera'' J.Gay (

Asteraceae The family Asteraceae, alternatively Compositae, consists of over 32,000 known species of flowering plants in over 1,900 genera within the order Asterales. Commonly referred to as the aster, daisy, composite, or sunflower family, Compositae w ...

), and many species, e.g. ''

Acacia sieberiana ''Vachellia sieberiana'', until recently known as ''Acacia sieberiana'' and commonly known as the paperbark thorn or paperbark acacia, is a tree native to southern Africa and introduced into Pakistan. It is used in many areas for various purposes ...

'', DC, '' Pleurothallis sieberi'' Luer, or '' Allium sieberianum'' Schult.f., ''

Crocus sieberi ''Crocus sieberi'', Sieber's crocus, also referred to as the Cretan crocus or snow crocus (as is ''Crocus chrysanthus''), is a plant of the genus ''Crocus'' in the family Iridaceae. A small, early blooming crocus, it easily naturalises, and is m ...

'', ''

Phyteuma ''Phyteuma'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Campanulaceae, native to Europe and Morocco. The common name is rampion, a name shared with the related plant ''Campanula rapunculus''. Rampion features prominently in some versions of t ...

sieberi'', ''

Luzula ''Luzula'' is a genus of flowering plants in the rush family Juncaceae. The genus has a cosmopolitan distribution, with species occurring throughout the world, especially in temperate regions, the Arctic, and higher elevation areas in the tropic ...

sieberi'', ''

Eucalyptus ''Eucalyptus'' () is a genus of over seven hundred species of flowering trees, shrubs or mallees in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalypteae, including '' Corymbia'', they are commonly known as euca ...

sieberi'', ''

Cheilanthes sieberi ''Cheilanthes sieberi'' is a small fern growing in many parts of Australia, New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and ...

'', ''

Callistemon ''Callistemon'' is a genus of shrubs in the family Myrtaceae, first described as a genus in 1814. The entire genus is endemic to Australia but widely cultivated in many other regions and naturalised in scattered locations. Their status as a se ...

sieberi'', '' Badula sieberi'', and '' Hosta sieberiana'', though some of these names may also have honored Friedrich Wilhelm Sieber.

References

External sources

Publications

Books by and about Sieber on WorldCat
1789 births 1844 deaths Botanists active in Australia Botanical collectors active in Australia 19th-century Austrian botanists German Bohemian people Scientists from Prague {{Austria-botanist-stub