George Kearsley Shaw (10 December 1751 – 22 July 1813) was an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...

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

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 ...

Life

Shaw was born at

Bierton Bierton is a village and civil parish in Buckinghamshire, England, about half a mile northeast of the town of Aylesbury. It is mainly a farming parish. Together with the hamlets of Broughton, Kingsbrook, Broughton Crossing and Burcott it hi ...

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-e ...

, and was educated at

Magdalen Hall, Oxford Hertford College ( ), previously known as Magdalen Hall, is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. It is located on Catte Street in the centre of Oxford, directly opposite the main gate to the Bodleian Library. The colle ...

, receiving his M.A. in 1772. He took up the profession of medical practitioner. In 1786 he became the assistant lecturer in botany at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

. He was a co-founder of the Linnean Society in 1788, and became a fellow of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

in 1789. In 1791 Shaw became assistant keeper of the natural history department at the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

, succeeding

Edward Whitaker Gray Edward Whitaker Gray (21 March 1748 – 27 December 1806), English botanist and secretary to the Royal Society, was uncle of Samuel Frederick Gray, author of ''The Practical Chemist.'' Educational and professional roles While attending the C ...

as keeper in 1806. He found that most of the items donated to the museum by

Hans Sloane Sir Hans Sloane, 1st Baronet (16 April 1660 – 11 January 1753), was an Irish physician, naturalist, and collector, with a collection of 71,000 items which he bequeathed to the British nation, thus providing the foundation of the British Mu ...

were in very bad condition. Medical and anatomical material was sent to the museum at the

Royal College of Surgeons The Royal College of Surgeons is an ancient college (a form of corporation) established in England to regulate the activity of surgeons. Derivative organisations survive in many present and former members of the Commonwealth. These organisations ...

, but many of the stuffed animals and birds had deteriorated and had to be burnt. He was succeeded after his death by his assistant Charles Konig.

Works

Shaw published one of the first English descriptions with scientific names of several Australian animals in his "Zoology of New Holland" (1794). He was among the first scientists to examine a

platypus The platypus (''Ornithorhynchus anatinus''), sometimes referred to as the duck-billed platypus, is a semiaquatic, egg-laying mammal endemic to eastern Australia, including Tasmania. The platypus is the sole living representative or mono ...

and published the first scientific description of it in ''The Naturalist's Miscellany'' in 1799. In the field of

herpetology Herpetology (from Greek ἑρπετόν ''herpetón'', meaning "reptile" or "creeping animal") is the branch of zoology concerned with the study of amphibians (including frogs, toads, salamanders, newts, and caecilians ( gymnophiona)) and ...

he described numerous new species of

reptiles Reptiles, as most commonly defined are the animals in the class Reptilia ( ), a paraphyletic grouping comprising all sauropsids except birds. Living reptiles comprise turtles, crocodilians, squamates ( lizards and snakes) and rhynchoceph ...

and

amphibians Amphibians are four-limbed and ectothermic vertebrates of the class Amphibia. All living amphibians belong to the group Lissamphibia. They inhabit a wide variety of habitats, with most species living within terrestrial, fossorial, arbo ...

. His other publications included: *''Musei Leveriani explicatio, anglica et Latina', containing select specimens from the museum of the late Sir Ashton Lever (1792–96), which had been moved to be displayed at the Blackfriars Rotunda. *''General Zoology, or Systematic Natural History'' (16 vol.) (1809–1826) (volumes IX to XVI by James Francis Stephens

*''The Naturalist's Miscellany: Or, Coloured Figures of Natural Objects; Drawn and Described Immediately From Nature'' (1789–1813) with Frederick Polydore Nodder (artist and engraver). The standard botanical author abbreviation G.Shaw is applied to

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 appropriat ...

he described.

References

*Mullens and Swann - ''A Bibliography of British Ornithology'' (1917) *William T. Stearn - ''The Natural History Museum at South Kensington''

External links

Zoologica

Göttingen State and University Library The Göttingen State and University Library (german: Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Göttingen or SUB Göttingen) is the library for Göttingen University as well as for the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and is the state l ...

Digitised 'The Naturalist's Miscellany'' and ''Musei Leveriani explicatio'' 1751 births 1813 deaths 18th-century British botanists English zoologists British mammalogists Botanists with author abbreviations Fellows of the Royal Society Fellows of the Linnean Society of London Alumni of Magdalen Hall, Oxford Employees of the British Museum 19th-century British botanists {{UK-zoologist-stub