René Oberthür (1852,
Rennes
Rennes (; br, Roazhon ; Gallo: ''Resnn''; ) is a city in the east of Brittany in northwestern France at the confluence of the Ille and the Vilaine. Rennes is the prefecture of the region of Brittany, as well as the Ille-et-Vilaine departme ...
– 27 April 1944) was a French
entomologist
Entomology () is the scientific study of insects, a branch of zoology. In the past the term "insect" was less specific, and historically the definition of entomology would also include the study of animals in other arthropod groups, such as ara ...
who specialised in
Coleoptera
Beetles are insects that form the order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Endopterygota. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 400,000 describe ...
.
With his brother
Charles Oberthür
Charles Oberthür (14 September 1845 – 1 June 1924) was a French amateur entomologist specializing in lepidoptera.
Biography
Charles Oberthür was born in Rennes, the son of the printer François-Charles Oberthür and Marie Hamelin, and bro ...
he worked in "Imprimerie Oberthür" the very successful printing business founded by his father
François-Charles Oberthür
François-Charles Oberthür (1818, Strasbourg – 1893) was the founder of the France, French printing group Imprimerie Oberthur (:fr:Imprimerie Oberthur, fr). In Strasbourg, François-Charles, an engraving, engraver, ran a printing press, with Alo ...
.
René and Charles supplied free bibles, missals, catechisms and other printwork to missionaries in exchange for insect specimens. In addition they purchased on a large scale, acquiring almost all the large collections sold during their lifetime.
Works
*''Coleopterorum Novitates''- Recueil spécialement consacré à l'étude des Coléoptères, Tome (Volume) 1 (1883)(the only published part of an intended series). Very few copies of this 80 page work, published by René himself, were printed and it ends abruptly.René Oberthür contributed "Scaphidides nouveaux"; "Nouvelles espèces de Monommides"; "Trois Nebria nouvelles"; "Un Coptolabrus nouveau"; "Carabiques récoltés à Saint-Laurent-du Maroni par Nodier"; "Deux espèces nouvelles de Geotrupides"; "Trois espèces nouvelles du genre Helota"; "Deux espèces nouvelles du genre Lemodes" There were only two other contributors
Maximilien Chaudoir "Carabiques nouveaux" and
Léon Fairmaire
Léon Marc Herminie Fairmaire (29 June 1820 – 1 April 1906) was a French entomologist.
A specialist in Coleoptera he assembled an immense collection comparable with that of Pierre François Marie Auguste Dejean (1780-1845). This is in the Muséu ...
''Note sur le genre Chalaenus and Espèces nouvelles d'Hétéromères de Madagascar''.
*with C. Houlbert (1913) Lucanides de Java. ''Insecta; revue illustree d’Entomologie'', Rennes 4 parts (1913–1914)-includes (1914) Catalogue systematique des lucanides considered somme ayant ete trouves dans l'ile de Java.
Collection
His collections are conserved by
Muséum national d'histoire naturelle
The French National Museum of Natural History, known in French as the ' (abbreviation MNHN), is the national natural history museum of France and a ' of higher education part of Sorbonne Universities. The main museum, with four galleries, is loc ...
(5 million specimens in 20,000 cases)
Museum Koenig and
Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Genova (Indomalayan and Papua Coleoptera).
References
* Anonym 1944
berthur, R.''Bull. Soc. Ent. Fr.'' 49 61
*Constantin, R. 1992 ''Memorial des Coléopteristes Français''.Bull. liaison Assoc. Col. reg. parisienne, Paris (Suppl. 14) : 1-92 67
*Vincent, R. 1986:
berthur, R.''Bull. liaison Assoc. Col. reg. parisienne'' 8: 8
External links
Culture France
{{DEFAULTSORT:Oberthur, Rene
1852 births
1944 deaths
Scientists from Rennes
French entomologists