![Genera Plantarum 1742](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Genera_Plantarum_1742.jpg)
''Genera Plantarum'' is a publication of Swedish naturalist
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 ...
(1707–1778). The first edition was issued in
Leiden
Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...
, 1737. The fifth edition served as a complementary volume to ''
Species Plantarum
' (Latin for "The Species of Plants") is a book by Carl Linnaeus, originally published in 1753, which lists every species of plant known at the time, classified into genera. It is the first work to consistently apply binomial names and was the ...
'' (1753). Article 13 of the
states that "''Generic names that appear in Linnaeus' ''Species Plantarum'' ed. 1 (1753) and ed. 2 (1762–63) are associated with the first subsequent description given under those names in Linnaeus' ''Genera Plantarum'' ed. 5 (1754) and ed. 6 (1764)''." This defines the starting point for nomenclature of most groups of plants.
[Stafleu, p. 102.]
The first edition of ''Genera Plantarum'' contains brief descriptions of the 935 plant genera that were known to Linnaeus at that time. It is dedicated to
Herman Boerhaave
Herman Boerhaave (, 31 December 1668 – 23 September 1738Underwood, E. Ashworth. "Boerhaave After Three Hundred Years." ''The British Medical Journal'' 4, no. 5634 (1968): 820–25. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20395297.) was a Dutch botanist, ...
, a Leiden physician who introduced Linnaeus to
George Clifford and the medico-botanical Dutch establishment of the day. ''Genera Plantarum'' employed his
“sexual system” of classification, in which plants are grouped according to the number of stamens and pistils in the flower. ''Genera Plantarum'' was revised several times by Linnaeus, the fifth edition being published in August 1754 (eds. 3 and 4 were not edited by Linnaeus) and linked to the first edition of ''Species Plantarum''.
Over the 16 years that passed between the publication of the first and fifth editions the number of genera listed had increased from 935 to 1105.
Linnaeus established the system of
binomial nomenclature
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 ...
through the widespread acceptance of his list of plants in the 1753 edition of ''Species Plantarum'', which is now taken as the starting point for all
botanical nomenclature
Botanical nomenclature is the formal, scientific naming of plants. It is related to, but distinct from Alpha taxonomy, taxonomy. Plant taxonomy is concerned with grouping and classifying plants; botanical nomenclature then provides names for the ...
. ''Genera Plantarum'' was an integral part of this first stepping stone towards a universal standardised
biological nomenclature
Nomenclature codes or codes of nomenclature are the various rulebooks that govern biological taxonomic nomenclature, each in their own broad field of organisms. To an end-user who only deals with names of species, with some awareness that species ...
.
History
From 1735 to 1738 Linnaeus worked in the Netherlands where he was personal physician to
George Clifford (1685–1760) a wealthy Anglo-Dutch merchant–banker with an impressive garden containing four large glasshouses that were filled with warmth-loving plants from overseas. Linnaeus was enthralled by these collections and prepared a detailed systematic catalogue of the plants in the garden, which he published in 1738 as ''
Hortus Cliffortianus
The ''Hortus Cliffortianus'' is a work of early botanical literature published in 1737.
The work was a collaboration between Carl Linnaeus and the illustrator Georg Dionysius Ehret, financed by George Clifford in 1735-1736. Clifford, a wealthy A ...
''. This list was published with engravings by
Georg Ehret
Georg Dionysius Ehret (30 January 1708 – 9 September 1770) was a German botanist and entomologist known for his botanical illustrations.
Life
Ehret was born in Germany to Ferdinand Christian Ehret, a gardener and competent draughtsman, ...
(1708–1770) and
Jan Wandelaer (1690–1759). Linnaeus included Ehret's Tabella (an illustration of his "Sexual System" of plant classification) in his ''Genera Plantarum'' but without credit to the artist. This provoked the accusation from Ehret that "When he was a beginner
innaeusappropriated everything for himself which he heard of, to make himself famous". Nevertheless, Ehret probably met Linnaeus again when the latter visited London for a month. The time in the Netherlands was a productive one for Linnaeus because in these four years he also published ''
Systema Naturae
' (originally in Latin written ' with the ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomen ...
'' (1735), ''
Bibliotheca Botanica'' (1736), ''
Fundamenta Botanica
''Fundamenta Botanica'' (“Foundations of botany”) (Amsterdam, Salomon Schouten, ed. 1, 1736) was one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and issued both as a separate work and part o ...
'' (1736), ''
Flora Lapponica
''Flora Lapponica'' (Amsterdam, 1737) is an account of the plants of Lapland written by botanist, zoologist and naturalist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1788) following his expedition to Lapland.
Over the period from 12 May 1732 to 10 September 1732, and ...
'' (1737) and ''
Critica Botanica'' (1737), this is in addition to his ''Genera Plantarum'' (1737).
One of Linnaeus's main points is that a botanist can and must know all genera, and must memorise their ‘definitions’ (diagnosis). The natural definitions given in the various editions of the ''Genera Plantarum'' are intended to facilitate this. Stability of generic taxonomy was one of his first aims, and the way he went about achieving it aroused the criticism of many of his contemporaries. Yet, this generic reform was one of his greatest achievements: his genera and their nomenclature stand at the beginning of the victory of
Linnaean taxonomy
Linnaean taxonomy can mean either of two related concepts:
# The particular form of biological classification (taxonomy) set up by Carl Linnaeus, as set forth in his ''Systema Naturae'' (1735) and subsequent works. In the taxonomy of Linnaeus t ...
.
[Stafleu, p. 91.] He dealt with the theory of generic names in the ''Critica Botanica'' which was a prelude to his main practical work on the subject, the ''Genera Plantarum''.
The rules for the formation of generic names are contained in the ''Fundamenta'' but are worked out in greater detail in the ''Critica''. The result was a reform of generic definitions that appeared in the ''Genera Plantarum''.
Publication and dedication
The type-setting of ''Genera Plantarum'' started in 1736 leading to the publication of the first edition in early 1737; the book was dedicated to Herman Boerhaave, the great Leiden physician to whom Linnaeus owed his introduction into the medico-botanical Dutch establishment of the day. Linnaeus published a revised edition in 1742. The fifth edition appeared in Stockholm, in 1754, and the sixth, the last one edited by Linnaeus himself, in 1764, also in Stockholm. The last edition that was based on Linnaeus's work was the 9th edition, revised by
Kurt Sprengel
Kurt Polycarp Joachim Sprengel (3 August 1766 – 15 March 1833) was a German botanist and physician who published an influential multivolume history of medicine, ''Versuch einer pragmatischen Geschichte der Arzneikunde'' (1792–99 in four vol ...
, and issued 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 ...
, 1830–31.
Botanical background
![Ehret-Methodus Plantarum Sexualis-original](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f0/Ehret-Methodus_Plantarum_Sexualis-original.jpg)
In the work Linnaeus divided the plant kingdom into 24 classes, each of which he named according to the number of stamens and their arrangement in the flowers. In Ehret's engraved plate these classes are represented by the 24 letters of the Latin alphabet. In Ehret's original drawing for the plate, preserved in the
Natural History Museum
A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more. ...
in London, he has written the name of the plant he had chosen as an example of each particular class, but only for the first ten and last four classes. Each of the first ten classes (A–K) is named according to the number of stamens, beginning with Monandria (one stamen), Diandria (two stamens), etc. up to Decandria (ten stamens). The flowers in the eleventh (L) class, Dodecandria, have 12–19 stamens. The following four classes (M–P) are characterized not only by the number of stamens but also by their position; the four classes (Q–T) have stamens united in a bundle or phalanx, the next three classes (V–Y) have stamens and pistils in separate flowers. The whole is completed with Cryptogamia (Z), which are plants without proper flowers. For this class Ehret chose the fig as an example.
Nomenclatural importance
By far the most important edition for nomenclature today is the fifth, published in August 1754 (editions 3 and 4 were not edited by Linnaeus); this is the edition which is linked nomenclaturally with the ''Species Plantarum'', the starting point for the naming of most groups of plants.
The genus descriptions in this edition were original, methodically and tersely drafted according to his own plan, with an asterisk * following the generic name to indicate that he had studied living material, a dagger † to indicate that he had seen only herbarium material, and the absence of these signs to indicate he had seen no material himself and hence depended upon the literature or correspondence. In preparing a description of a genus he would describe the flower and fruit of the main species most familiar to him and then remove the characters that did not occur in other species. As new species were added Linnaeus should have updated his genus descriptions but in practice did not have time to do so. As a result, some species listed in ''Species Plantarum'' do not fit the descriptions in ''Genus Plantarum''.
All generic names in ''Genera Plantarum'' ed. 5 are treated as validly published on 1 May 1753.
Significance
William Stearn
William Thomas Stearn (16 April 1911 – 9 May 2001) was a British botanist. Born in Cambridge in 1911, he was largely self-educated, and developed an early interest in books and natural history. His initial work experience was at ...
states: “The clear typographical layout, the elimination of verbs such as est, occupant and abit, and the much greater detail given for all floral parts … immediately catch the attention. Such improvements in technique made Linnaeus's ''Genera Plantarum'' the model for later works on the genera of plants.”
Frans Stafleu
Frans Antonie Stafleu (8 September 1921 – 16 December 1997) was a Dutch systematic botanist, former Chair of the Institute of Systematic Botany at the University of Utrecht, and author of ''Taxonomic Literature: A Selective Guide to Botanical ...
regards ''Genera Plantarum'' as Linnaeus's most important book with respect to the practical introduction of his ideas – even more than ''Systema Naturae''. The notion that the genus is the basic unit of taxonomy remained in force until the advent of evolutionary biology and biosystematics. “His reform was daring and thorough, based on an exceptional and practical knowledge of plants; although influenced by somewhat outmoded ideas, it had exactly the salutary effect which he wanted it to have: consistency and simplicity. These two were prime needs for taxonomy in 1737."
[Stafleu, p. 103.]
References
Bibliography
* Stafleu, Frans A. 1971. ''Linnaeus and the Linnaeans: the Spreading of their Ideas in Systematic Botany, 1735–1789''. Utrecht: International Association for Plant Taxonomy. .
* Stearn, William T. 1960. “Notes on Linnaeus’s ‘Genera Plantarum’”. In Carl Linnaeus, Genera plantarum fifth edition 1754. Facsimile reprint Weinheim. ''Historiae Naturalis Classica'' 3.
*
Stearn, William T. 1971. In Blunt, William. ''The Compleat Naturalist: a Life of Linnaeus''. New York: Frances Lincoln. .
* Stearn, William T. 1986. ''Linnaeus and his students''. In "The Oxford Companion to Gardens". Jellicoe, Geoffrey et al. (eds). Oxford: Oxford University Press. .
External links
''Genera Plantarum'' online(the second edition (Leiden, 1742) on Google books)
A translation of Carl Linnaeus’s introduction to ''Genera Plantarum'' (1737)
{{Authority control
1737 books
Botanical nomenclature
Florae (publication)
Botany books
Carl Linnaeus
1737 in science
Biology and natural history in the Dutch Republic
18th-century Latin books