By the 18th century Scientists and nature lovers have done a great job collecting and describing plants and animals all over the world. But it became increasingly difficult to navigate the ocean of information they had accumulated. The Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus generalized and systematized this knowledge. He laid the foundations of modern taxonomy.
Carl Linnaeus was born on May 23, 1707 in the family of a village priest. From childhood, Karl’s mother instilled in him a love for all living things, especially flowers.
But the future president of the Swedish Academy of Sciences remained very indifferent to schoolwork. He was never good at Latin. The teachers said that education was apparently beyond the boy's ability - it would be better to teach him some kind of craft. The angry father decided to send Karl to be trained by a shoemaker.
And a career as a shoemaker would have awaited Liney if a doctor he knew had not persuaded the boy’s father to allow him to study medicine. In addition, he helped Karl finish high school.
Karl studied medicine and biology at the universities of the Swedish cities of Lund and Uppsala. During his student years he lived poorly.
When Karl turned 25 years old, the leadership of Uppsala University invited him to go on a scientific trip to northern Scandinavia - Lapland to explore its nature. He carried all his luggage on his shoulders. During this journey, he ate whatever he could find, barely got out of the swamps, and fought with mosquitoes. And once he encountered a more serious enemy - a robber who almost killed him. Despite all the obstacles, Linnaeus collected samples of plants from Lapland.
At home, Linnaeus was unable to find a permanent job in his specialty, and for several years he moved to Holland, where he was in charge of one of the best botanical gardens in the country.
Here he received his doctorate, and here in 1735 his most famous work, “The System of Nature,” was published. During Linnaeus's lifetime, 12 editions of this book were published. All this time, Linnaeus constantly supplemented it and increased its volume from 14 pages to 3 volumes.
Carl Linnaeus system:
The concept of a species.
In order to “sort out” the huge number of descriptions of plants and animals, some kind of systematic unit was needed. Linnaeus considered species to be such a unit common to all living things. Linnaeus called a species a group of individuals similar to each other, like children of the same parents and their children. A species consists of many similar individuals that produce fertile offspring. For example, wild raspberries are one species, stone fruits are another, and cloudberries are a third type of plant. All domestic cats are one species, tigers are another, lions are a third species of animals. Therefore, the entire organic world consists of various types plants and animals. All living nature consists, as it were, of individual links - species.
Linnaeus discovered and described about 1,500 species of plants and over 400 species of animals, he distributed all types of plants and animals into large groups - classes, he divided each class into orders, each order into genera. Each genus of Linnaeus was composed of similar species.
Nomenclature.
Linnaeus began to give names to species in the same Latin that was so bad for him in his school years. Latin was at that time the international language of science. Thus, Linnaeus resolved a difficult problem: after all, when names were given in different languages, the same species could be described under many names.
A very important achievement of Linnaeus was the introduction into practice of double species names (binary nomenclature). He suggested calling each species in two words. The first is the name of the genus, which includes closely related species. For example, lion, tiger, and domestic cat belong to the genus Felis (Cat). The second word is the name of the species itself (respectively, Felis leo, Felis tigris, Felis do-mestica). In the same way, the species Norway Spruce and Tien Shan (blue) Spruce are combined into the genus Spruce, and the species White Hare and Brown Hare into the genus Hare. Thanks to double nomenclature, the similarity, commonality, and unity of species forming one genus are revealed.
Taxonomy of animals.
Linnaeus divided animals into 6 classes:
Mammals
Amphibians (he placed amphibians and reptiles in this class)
Insects
The “worms” included mollusks, jellyfish, various worms, and all microorganisms (the latter were united by Linnaeus into one single genus - Chaos infusorium).
Linnaeus, quite boldly for his time, placed man (whom he dubbed “reasonable man,” Homo sapiens) in the class of mammals and the order of primates along with monkeys. He did this 120 years before Charles Darwin. He did not believe that humans descended from other primates, but he saw great similarities in their structure.
Plant taxonomy.
Linnaeus approached the systematization of plants in more detail than the systematization of animals. Among plants, he identified 24 classes. Linnaeus understood that the most essential and characteristic part of a plant is the flower. He classified plants with one stamen in a flower as 1st class, with two as 2nd, with three as 3rd, etc. Mushrooms, lichens, algae, horsetails, ferns - in general, everything devoid of flowers ended up in the 24th class ("cryptogamy").
The artificiality of Linnaeus' taxonomy.
Linnaeus' system of plants and animals was largely artificial. Plants that are far from each other (for example, carrots and currants) ended up in the same class only because their flowers have the same number of stamens. Many related plants ended up in different classes. Linnaeus' taxonomy is artificial, also because it helped to recognize plants and animals, but did not reflect the course of the historical development of the world.
Linnaeus was aware of this shortcoming of his system. He believed that future naturalists should create a natural system of plants and animals, which should take into account all the characteristics of organisms, and not just one or two characteristics. Trying to develop a natural plant system, Linnaeus became convinced that the science of that time did not provide the necessary knowledge for this.
Despite its artificiality, Linnaeus' system played a positive role in biology. The systematic divisions and dual nomenclature proposed by Linnaeus have become firmly established in science and are used in modern botany and zoology. Later two more divisions were introduced:
Type - the highest division, uniting similar classes;
Family - uniting similar genera
Innovations of Linnaeus.
Carl Linnaeus reformed the botanical language. He was the first to propose such plant names as: corolla, anther, nectary, ovary, stigma, filament, receptacle, perianth. In total, C. Linnaeus introduced about a thousand terms into botany.
Linnaeus' views on nature.
Science at that time was influenced by religion. Linnaeus was an idealist; he argued that in nature there are as many species of plants and animals “as many different forms as the Almighty produced at the beginning of the world.” Linnaeus believed that plant and animal species do not change; they have retained their characteristics “since creation.” According to Linnaeus, every modern species is the offspring of an original divinely created parent pair. Each species reproduces, but retains, in his opinion, unchanged all the features of this ancestral pair.
As a good observer, Linnaeus could not help but see the contradiction between the ideas of the complete immutability of plants and animals with what is observed in nature. He allowed the formation of varieties within a species due to the influence of climate change and other external conditions on organisms.
The idealistic and metaphysical doctrine of creation and the immutability of species dominated biology until the beginning of the 19th century, until it was refuted as a result of the discovery of many proofs of evolution.
Swedish naturalist, "father of modern botanical taxonomy" and creator of modern biological nomenclature.
Born on May 23, 1707 in Roshult in the province of Småland in the family of a village pastor. His parents wanted Karl to become a clergyman, but from his youth he was fascinated by natural history, especially botany. These activities were encouraged by a local doctor, who advised Linnaeus to choose a medical profession, since at that time botany was considered a part of pharmacology. In 1727, Linnaeus entered the University of Lund, and the following year he moved to Uppsala University, where the teaching of botany and medicine was better. In Uppsala he lived and worked with Olaf Celsius, a theologian and amateur botanist who participated in the preparation of the book Biblical Botany (Hierobotanicum) - a list of plants mentioned in the Bible. In 1729, as a New Year's gift to Celsius, Linnaeus wrote the essay Introduction to the Engagements of Plants (Praeludia sponsalorum plantarun), in which he poetically described their sexual process. This work not only delighted Celsius, but also aroused the interest of university teachers and students. It predetermined the main range of Linnaeus' future interests - the classification of plants according to their reproductive organs. In 1731, having defended his dissertation, Linnaeus became an assistant to professor of botany O. Rudbeck. The following year he traveled to Lapland. For three months he wandered around this then wild country, collecting plant samples. The Uppsala Scientific Society, which subsidized this work, published only a short report about it - Flora Lapponica. Linnaeus's detailed work on the plants of Lapland was published only in 1737, and his vividly written diary of the expedition Lapland Life (Lachesis Lapponica) was published after the author's death in a Latin translation.
In 1733-1734 Linnaeus lectured and led scientific work at the university, wrote a number of books and articles. However, pursuing a medical career traditionally required obtaining an advanced degree abroad. In 1735 he entered the University of Harderwijk in Holland, where he soon received his doctorate in medicine. In Holland, he became close to the famous Leiden doctor G. Boerhaave, who recommended Linnaeus to the burgomaster of Amsterdam, Georg Clifford, a passionate gardener, who by that time had collected a magnificent collection of exotic plants. Clifford made Linnaeus his personal physician and instructed him to identify and classify the specimens he bred. The result was the excellent treatise Clifford's Garden (Hortus Cliffortianus), published in 1737.
In 1736-1738, the first editions of many of Linnaeus's works were published in Holland: in 1736 - System of Nature (Systema naturae), Botanical Library (Bibliotheca botanica) and Fundamentals of Botany (Fundamenta botanica); in 1737 - Criticism of botany (Critica botanica), Genera of plants (Genera plantarum), Flora of Lapland (Flora Lapponica) and the Cliffortian garden (Hortus Cliffortianus); in 1738 - Classes of plants (Classes plantarum), Collection of genera (Corollarium generum) and Sexual method (Methodus sexualist). In addition, in 1738 Linnaeus edited a book on fish, Ichthyologia, which remained unfinished after the death of his friend Peter Artedi. Botanical works, especially plant genera, formed the basis of modern plant taxonomy. In them, Linnaeus described and applied a new classification system that greatly simplified the identification of organisms. In his method, which he called "sexual", the main emphasis was on the structure and number of reproductive structures of plants, i.e. stamens (male organs) and pistils (female organs). Although Linnaeus's classification is largely artificial, it was so much more convenient than all the systems existing at that time that it soon received universal recognition. Its rules were formulated so simply and clearly that they seemed to be the laws of nature, and Linnaeus himself, of course, considered them as such. However, his views on the sexual process in plants, although they were not original, also found their critics: some accused Linnaeus’s teaching of immorality, others of excessive anthropomorphism.
An even more daring work than botanical work was the famous System of Nature. Its first edition of about a dozen printed pages, representing a general outline of the intended book, was an attempt to distribute all the creations of nature - animals, plants and minerals - into classes, orders, genera and species, and also to establish rules for their identification. Corrected and expanded editions of this treatise were published 12 times during Linnaeus's life and were reprinted several times after his death.
In 1738, Linnaeus, on behalf of Clifford, visited the botanical centers of England. By that time, he had already earned international recognition among naturalists and received invitations to work in Holland and Germany. However, Linnaeus chose to return to Sweden. In 1739 he opened a medical practice in Stockholm and continued to study natural history. In 1741 he was appointed professor of medicine at Uppsala University, and in 1742 he also became professor of botany there. In subsequent years, he mainly taught and wrote scientific works, but at the same time he made several scientific expeditions to little-studied areas of Sweden and published a report on each of them. Linnaeus's enthusiasm, his fame, and most importantly his ability to infect those around him with the desire to find something new attracted many followers to him. He collected a huge herbarium and a collection of plants. Collectors from all over the world sent him specimens of unknown forms of life, and he described their findings in his books.
In 1745 Linnaeus published the Flora of Sweden (Flora Suecica), in 1746 - the Fauna of Sweden (Fauna Suecica), in 1748 - the Uppsala Garden (Hortus Upsaliensis). New editions of The System of Nature continue to be published in Sweden and abroad. Some of them, especially the sixth (1748), tenth (1758) and twelfth (1766), significantly supplemented the previous ones. The famous 10th and 12th editions became encyclopedic multi-volume sets, not only representing an attempt to classify natural objects, but also gave brief descriptions, i.e. distinctive features of all species of animals, plants and minerals known at that time. The article about each species was supplemented with information about its geographical distribution, habitat, behavior and varieties. The 12th edition was the most complete, but the 10th edition acquired the greatest importance. It was from the moment of its publication that the priority of modern zoological nomenclature was established, because it was in this book that Linnaeus first gave double (binary, or binomial) names to all animal species known to him. In 1753 he completed his great work Plant species (Species plantarum); it contained descriptions and binary names all plant species, which determined modern botanical nomenclature. In his book Philosophia botanica, published in 1751, Linnaeus aphoristically outlined the principles that guided his study of plants. The German writer, thinker and naturalist Goethe admitted: “Besides Shakespeare and Spinoza, Linnaeus had the strongest influence on me.”
Carl Linnaeus
(1707-1778)
Carl Linnaeus, the famous Swedish naturalist, was born in Sweden on May 13, 1707. He was of humble origin, his ancestors were simple peasants; father was a poor rural priest. The next year after the birth of his son, he received a more profitable parish in Stenbrogult, and the entire childhood of Carl Linnaeus passed until he was ten years old.
My father was a great lover of flowers and gardening; in picturesque Stenbrogult he planted a garden, which soon became the first in the entire province. This garden and his father’s activities played, of course, a significant role in the spiritual development of the future founder of scientific botany. The boy was given a special corner in the garden, several beds, where he was considered the complete owner; they were called that way - “Karl’s kindergarten”
When the boy was 10 years old, he was sent to primary school in the city of Vexier. School lessons the gifted child went poorly; He continued to study botany with enthusiasm, and preparing lessons was tiresome for him. The father was going to take the young man from the gymnasium, but chance confronted him with the local doctor Rothman. Rothman’s classes at the “underperforming” gymnasium went better. The doctor began to gradually introduce him to medicine and even - contrary to the teachers' comments - made him fall in love with Latin.
After graduating from high school, Karl enters Lund University, but soon moves from there to one of the most prestigious universities Sweden - in Uppsala. Linnaeus was only 23 years old when botany professor Oluas Celzky took him as his assistant, after which Karl himself, while still a student, began teaching at the university. A trip to Lapland became very significant for the young scientist. Linnaeus walked almost 700 kilometers, collected significant collections and as a result published his first book, “Flora of Lapland.”
In the spring of 1735, Linnaeus arrived in Holland, in Amsterdam. In the small university town of Hardwick, he passed the exam and on June 24 defended his dissertation on a medical topic - about fever. The immediate goal of his journey was achieved, but Karl remained. He stayed, fortunately for himself and for science: rich and highly cultured Holland served as the cradle for his hot creative activity and his loud fame.
One of his new friends, Doctor Gronov, suggested that he publish some work; then Linnaeus compiled and published the first draft of his famous work, which laid the foundation for systematic zoology and botany in modern sense. This was the first edition of his “Systema naturae”, which for now contained only 14 pages of a huge format, on which brief descriptions of minerals, plants and animals were grouped in the form of tables. This publication marks the beginning of a series of rapid scientific successes for Linnaeus.
His new works, published in 1736-1737, already contained in a more or less complete form his main and most fruitful ideas: a system of generic and species names, improved terminology, an artificial system of the plant kingdom.
At this time, he received a brilliant offer to become the personal physician of Georg Clifford with a salary of 1000 guilders and full allowance.
Despite the successes that surrounded Linnaeus in Holland, little by little he began to be drawn home. In 1738 he returned to his homeland and encountered unexpected problems. He, who got used to it in three years life abroad to universal respect, friendship and attentions of the most outstanding and famous people, at home, in his homeland, there was just a doctor without a place, without practice and without money, and no one cared about his scholarship. So Linnaeus the botanist gave way to Linnaeus the doctor, and his favorite activities were stopped for a while.
However, already in 1739, the Swedish Diet allocated him one hundred lukat annual allowance with the obligation to teach botany and mineralogy.
Finally, he found an opportunity to get married, and on June 26, 1739, the five-year-delayed wedding took place. Alas, as often happens, his wife was the complete opposite of her husband. An ill-mannered, rude and grumpy woman, without intellectual interests, who was only interested in the financial side of her husband. Linnaeus had one son and several daughters; the mother loved her daughters, and they grew up under her influence as uneducated and petty girls of a bourgeois family. The mother had a strange antipathy towards her son, a gifted boy, persecuted him in every possible way and tried to turn his father against him. But Linnaeus loved his son and passionately developed in him those inclinations for which he himself suffered so much in childhood.
In 1742, Linnaeus's dream came true, and he became a professor of botany at his home university. The rest of his life was spent in this city almost without a break. He occupied the department for more than thirty years and left it only shortly before his death.
Now Linnaeus stopped practicing medicine and was engaged only in scientific research. He described all the medicinal plants known at that time and studied the effects of medicines made from them.
At this time, he invented a thermometer using the Celsius temperature scale.
But Linnaeus still considered the systematization of plants to be the main work of his life. The main work, “The Plant System,” took 25 years, and only in 1753 did he publish his main work.
The scientist decided to systematize all vegetable world Earth. At the time when Lineus began his work, zoology was in a period of exceptional dominance of taxonomy. The task that she then set for herself was to simply become familiar with all the breeds of animals living on the globe, without regard to their internal structure and to the connection of individual forms with each other; The subject of zoological writings of that time was a simple listing and description of all known animals.
Thus, zoology and botany of that time were mainly concerned with the study and description of species, but there was boundless confusion in their recognition. The descriptions that the author gave of new animals or plants were confusing and inaccurate. The second main drawback of the science of that time was the lack of more or less basic and accurate classification.
These main shortcomings of systematic zoology and botany were corrected by the genius of Linnaeus. Remaining on the same ground of study of nature on which his predecessors and contemporaries stood, he became a powerful reformer of science. His merit is purely methodological. He did not discover new areas of knowledge and hitherto unknown laws of nature, but he created a new method, clear and logical. And with his help, he brought light and order where chaos and confusion reigned before him, which gave a huge impetus to science, powerfully paving the way for further research. It was necessary step in science, without which further progress would be impossible.
The scientist proposed a binary nomenclature - a system of scientific names for plants and animals. Based on structural features, he divided all plants into 24 classes, also highlighting individual genera and species. Each name, in his opinion, should have consisted of two words - generic and species designations.
Despite the fact that the principle he applied was quite artificial, it turned out to be very convenient and became generally acceptable in scientific classification, retaining its significance in our time. But in order for the new nomenclature to be fruitful, it was necessary for the new nomenclature to be fruitful, it was necessary that the species given the conventional name should at the same time be so accurately and thoroughly described that they could not be confused with other species of the same kind. Linnaeus did just that: he was the first to introduce into science a strictly defined, precise language and a precise definition of characteristics.
His work “Fundamental Botany,” published in Amsterdam during his life with Clifford and the result of seven years of work, sets out the foundations of the botanical terminology that he used when describing plants.
Linnaeus's zoological system did not play such a major role in science as the botanical one, although in some respects it stood above it as less artificial, but it did not represent its main advantages - convenience in definition. Linnaeus had little knowledge of anatomy.
Linnaeus's work gave a huge impetus to systematic botany and zoology. The developed terminology and convenient nomenclature made it easier to cope with enormous material, which was previously so difficult to understand. Soon all classes of plants and the animal kingdom were subjected to careful systematic study, and the number of described species increased from hour to hour.
Linnaeus later applied his principle to the classification of all nature, in particular minerals and rocks. He also became the first scientist to classify humans and monkeys into the same group of animals - primates. As a result of his observations, the natural scientist compiled another book - “The System of Nature”. He worked on it all his life, republishing his work from time to time. In total, the scientist prepared 12 editions of this work, which gradually turned from a small book into a voluminous multi-volume publication.
Last years Linnaeus's life was overshadowed by senile decrepitude and illness. He died on January 10, 1778, in the seventy-first year of his age.
After his death, the chair of botany at Uppsala University was given to his son, who zealously set about continuing his father’s work. But in 1783 he suddenly fell ill and died in his forty-second year. The son was not married, and with his death the lineage of Linnaeus in the male generation ceased.
Carl Linnaeus (Swedish Carl Linnaeus, Carl Linné, Latin Carolus Linnaeus, after receiving the nobility in 1761 - Carl von Linné; May 23, 1707, Roshult - January 10, 1778, Uppsala) - Swedish naturalist and physician, creator unified system flora and fauna, which generalized and largely streamlined the biological knowledge of the entire previous period and brought him worldwide fame during his lifetime. One of Linnaeus's main achievements was the definition of the concept of biological species, the introduction into active use of binomial (binary) nomenclature and the establishment of a clear subordination between systematic (taxonomic) categories.
Linnaeus is the most famous Swedish natural scientist. In Sweden he is also valued as a traveler who opened their own country, studied the uniqueness of the Swedish provinces and saw “how one province can help another.” The value for the Swedes is not so much Linnaeus’s work on the flora and fauna of Sweden as his descriptions of his own travels; these diary entries, full of specifics, rich in contrasts, presented in clear language, are still reprinted and read. Linnaeus is one of those scientific and cultural figures with whom the final formation of the literary Swedish language in its modern form is associated.
Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (1739, one of the founders of the academy), the Paris Academy of Sciences (1762) and a number of other scientific societies and academies.
early years
Carl Linnaeus was born on May 23, 1707 in Southern Sweden- in the village of Roshult, Småland province. His father is Nils Ingemarsson Linnæus (Swedish: Nicolaus (Nils) Ingemarsson Linnæus, 1674-1748), a village priest, the son of a peasant; mother - Christina Linnæa (Linnea), née Broderson (Swedish: Christina Linnæa (Brodersonia), 1688-1733), daughter of a village priest. The surname Linnæus is a Latinized Swedish name for the linden tree (Lind): when Nils Ingemarsson went to study at Lund University, he, according to the custom of that time, replaced his real surname with a Latin pseudonym, choosing as it a word associated with the Ingemarsson family symbol - a large three-trunked linden tree , growing up on the lands of his ancestors in the parish of Hvitavryd in southern Sweden. In Sweden, Linnaeus is usually called Carl von Linné - after the name he began to bear after his elevation to the nobility; in the tradition of literature English language- call him Carl Linnaeus, that is, by the name that was given to him at birth.
Karl was the first-born in the family (later Nils Ingemarsson and Christina had four more children - three girls and a boy).
In 1709, the family moved to Stenbruhult (Swedish) Russian, located a couple of kilometers from Roshult. There, Nils Linnaeus planted a small garden near his house, which he lovingly tended. From early childhood, Karl also showed an interest in plants.
In 1716-1727, Carl Linnaeus studied in the city of Växjö: first at the lower grammar school (1716-1724), then at the gymnasium (1724-1727). Since Växjö was about fifty kilometers from Stenbruhult, Karl was only at home during the holidays. His parents wanted him to study to be a pastor and in the future, as the eldest son, to take his father’s place, but Karl studied very poorly, especially in the basic subjects of theology and ancient languages. He was only interested in botany and mathematics; Often he even skipped classes, going into nature to study plants instead of school.
Dr. Johan Stensson Rothman (German) Russian. (1684-1763), the district doctor who taught logic and medicine at Linnaeus’s school, persuaded Niels Linnaeus to send his son to study as a doctor and began to study medicine, physiology and botany with Karl individually. The parents' concerns about Karl's fate were related, in particular, to the fact that finding work in Sweden for a doctor at that time was very difficult, while at the same time there were no problems with work for a priest.
Study in Lund and Uppsala
Lund was the closest city to Växjö that had higher educational institution. In 1727, Linnaeus passed the exams and was enrolled at Lund University, where he began to study natural history and medicine. Linnaeus was most interested in the lectures of Professor Kilian Stobeus (Swedish) Russian. (1690-1742). Linnaeus settled at the professor's house; It was with the help of Stobeus that he largely put in order the information that he had gleaned from books and his own observations.
In August 1728, Linnaeus, on the advice of Johan Rothman, transferred to the larger and older University of Uppsala, founded in 1474 - there was more possibilities study medicine. There were two professors of medicine working in Uppsala at that time, Olof Rudbeck Jr. (1660-1740) and Lars Ruberg (Swedish) Russian. (1664-1742).
At the University of Uppsala, Linnaeus met his peer, student Peter Artedi (1705-1735), together with whom they began work on a critical revision of the natural history classifications that existed at that time. Linnaeus mainly studied plants in general, Artedi - fish, amphibians and umbrella plants. It should be noted that the level of teaching at both universities was not very high and most of the time students were engaged in self-education.
Manuscript of Linnaeus' work Praeludia sponsaliorum plantarum (December 1729)
In 1729, Linnaeus met Olof Celsius (Swedish) Russian. (1670-1756), professor of theology, who was a keen botanist. This meeting turned out to be very important for Linnaeus: he soon settled in the house of Celsus and gained access to his extensive library. In the same year, Linnaeus wrote a short work “Introduction to the Sexual Life of Plants” (lat. Praeludia sponsaliorum plantarum), which outlined the main ideas of his future classification of plants based on sexual characteristics. This work aroused great interest in academic circles in Uppsala.
Since 1730, Linnaeus, under the supervision of Professor Olof Rudbeck Jr., began teaching as a demonstrator in the botanical garden of the university. Linnaeus's lectures were a great success. In the same year, he moved into the professor’s house and began serving as a home teacher in his family. Linnaeus, however, did not live in the Rudbeks’ house for too long, the reason for which was an unfulfilled relationship with the professor’s wife.
It is known about educational excursions that Linnaeus conducted in these years in the vicinity of Uppsala.
Linnaeus also had a good relationship with another professor of medicine, Lars Ruberg. Ruberg was a follower of Cynic philosophy, seemed a strange person, dressed poorly, but was a talented scientist and owner big library. Linnaeus admired him and was an active follower of the new mechanistic physiology, which was based on the fact that the entire diversity of the world has a single structure and can be reduced to a relatively small number of rational laws, just as physics is reduced to Newton’s laws. The main postulate of this doctrine, “man is a machine” (lat. homo machina est), in relation to medicine as presented by Ruberg looked like in the following way: “The heart is a pump, the lungs are a bellows, the stomach is a trough.” It is known that Linnaeus was an adherent of another thesis - “man is an animal” (lat. homo animal est). In general, this mechanistic approach to natural phenomena contributed to the drawing of many parallels both between different areas of natural science and between nature and socio-cultural phenomena. It was on such views that the plans for reforming the entire science of nature, which were built by Linnaeus and his friend Peter Artedi, were based; their idea was to create a single, ordered system of knowledge that would be easily reviewable. On May 12, 1732, Linnaeus set out for Lapland.
The idea of this trip largely belonged to Professor Olof Rudbeck the Younger, who in 1695 traveled specifically through Lapland (this trip of Rudbeck can be called the first scientific expedition in Sweden), and later, based on materials collected including in Lapland, wrote and illustrated a book about birds that he showed to Linnaeus.
Linnaeus returned from Lapland in the fall, on October 10, with collections and records. In the same year, Florula lapponica (“ Brief flora Lapland"), in which the so-called “plant reproductive system” of 24 classes, based on the structure of stamens and pistils, appears for the first time in print.
During this period, universities in Sweden did not issue doctoral degrees in medicine, and Linnaeus, without a doctoral diploma, could not continue teaching in Uppsala.
In 1733, Linnaeus was actively involved in mineralogy and wrote a textbook on this topic. At Christmas 1733, he moved to Falun, where he began teaching assay art and mineralogy.
In 1734, Linnaeus made a botanical journey to the province of Dalarna
Linnaeus in “Lapland” costume (in the national costume of the Sami) (1737). Painting by Dutch artist Martin Hoffman. It is clear that in right hand Linnaeus holds his favorite plant, a little later named after him - linnaea. Linnaeus brought the Sami costume, as well as the herbarium of the Lapland flora, along with the manuscript “Flora of Lapland” to Holland
Dutch period
In the spring of 1735, Linnaeus went to Holland for his doctorate, accompanying one of his students. Before arriving in Holland, Linnaeus visited Hamburg. On June 23, he received his doctorate in medicine from the University of Harderwijk, defending his thesis “A new hypothesis of intermittent fevers” (on the causes of malaria). From Harderwijk, Linnaeus headed to Leiden, where he published a small work, Systema naturae (“System of Nature”), which opened the way for him to the circle of learned doctors, naturalists and collectors in Holland, who revolved around the professor of Leiden University, Hermann Boerhaave (1668-1738), who enjoyed European fame .
In August 1735, Linnaeus, with the patronage of friends, received the position of caretaker of the collections and botanical garden of George Clifford (English) Russian. (1685–1760), burgomaster of Amsterdam and director of the Dutch East India Company. The garden was located on the Hartekamp (n.d.)Russian estate. near the city of Haarlem; Linnaeus was involved in the description and classification large collection live exotic plants delivered to Holland by company ships from all over the world.
Moved to Holland and close friend Linnea Peter Artedi. He worked in Amsterdam, organizing the collections of Albert Seb (1665-1736), traveler, zoologist and pharmacist. Artedi managed to finish his general work on ichthyology, and also identified all the fish from Seb’s collection and made their description; Unfortunately, on September 27, 1735, Artedi drowned in a canal after tripping while returning home at night. Linnaeus and Artedi bequeathed their manuscripts to each other, but for the handing over of the manuscripts to Artedi, the owner of the apartment in which he lived demanded a large ransom, which was paid by Linnaeus thanks to the assistance of George Clifford. Later, Linnaeus prepared his friend's manuscript for printing and published it (Ichtyologia, 1738). Linnaeus also used Artedi's proposals for the classification of fish and umbrellas in his works.
In the summer of 1736, Linnaeus lived for several months in England, where he met with the famous botanists of the time, Hans Sloane (1660–1753) and Johan Jakob Dillenius (1687–1747). The three years Linnaeus spent in Holland were one of the most productive periods of his scientific biography. During this time, his main works were published: in addition to the first edition of Systema naturae (“System of Nature”), Linnaeus managed to publish Bibliotheca Botanica (“Botanical Library” - a systematic catalog of literature on botany), Fundamenta Botanica (“Foundations of Botany” - a collection of aphorisms about the principles descriptions and classifications of plants), Musa Cliffordiana (“Clifford’s Banana” - a description of a banana growing in Clifford’s garden, in this work Linnaeus makes one of the first sketches natural system plants), Hortus Cliffortianus (German) Russian. ("Clifford's Garden" - a description of the garden), Flora Lapponica ("The Lapland Flora" - a complete edition; an abridged version of this work, Florula lapponica, was published in 1732), Genera plantarum ("Genera of Plants" - characteristics of plant genera), Classes plantarum ("Classes of plants" - a comparison of all plant systems known at that time with the system of Linnaeus himself and the first publication of Linnaeus's natural plant system in in full), Critica botanica (a set of rules for the formation of names of plant genera). Some of these books came with wonderful illustrations by artist George Ehret. (1708-1770).
In 1738, Linnaeus returned to Sweden, visiting Paris along the way, where he met the botanists the Jussieux brothers.
Linnaeus family
In 1734, at Christmas, Linnaeus met his future wife: her name was Sara Elisabeth (Elisabeth, Lisa) Moraea (Moræa), 1716-1806, she was the daughter of Johan Hansson Moreus (Swedish: Johan Hansson Moraeus (Moræus), 1672–1742), city doctor in Falun. Just two weeks after they met, Linnaeus proposed to her. In the spring of 1735, shortly before leaving for Europe, Linnaeus and Sarah became engaged (without a formal ceremony). Linnaeus partially received money for the trip from his future father-in-law.
In 1738, after returning from Europe, Linnaeus and Sarah officially became engaged, and in September 1739, a wedding took place in the Moreus family farm.
Their first child (later known as Carl Linnaeus Jr.) was born in 1741. They had a total of seven children (two boys and five girls), of whom two (a boy and a girl) died in infancy.
The genus of beautifully flowering South African perennials from the Iris family (Iridaceae) was named Moraea (Morea) by Linnaeus - in honor of his wife and her father.
Linnaeus's family coat of arms
Morea flower - a plant named by Linnaeus in honor of his wife Sarah Lisa Morea and her father
Mature years in Stockholm and Uppsala
Returning to his homeland, Linnaeus opened a medical practice in Stockholm (1738). Having cured several ladies-in-waiting from coughs with a decoction of fresh leaves yarrow, he soon became a court physician and one of the most fashionable doctors in the capital. It is known that in his medical work, Linnaeus actively used strawberries - both to treat gout and to cleanse the blood, improve complexion, and reduce weight. In 1739, Linnaeus, having headed the naval hospital, obtained permission to autopsy the corpses of the dead to determine the cause of death.
In addition to his medical activities, Linnaeus taught in Stockholm at a mining school.
In 1739, Linnaeus took part in the formation of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (which in the early years of its existence was a private society) and became its first chairman.
In October 1741, Linnaeus took up the post of professor of medicine at Uppsala University and moved to the professor's house, located in the University Botanical Garden (now the Linnaeus Garden). The position of professor allowed him to concentrate on writing books and dissertations on natural history. Linnaeus worked at Uppsala University until the end of his life.
On behalf of the Swedish Parliament, Linnaeus participated in scientific expeditions- in 1741 to Öland and Gotland, Swedish islands in the Baltic Sea, in 1746 - to the province of Västergötland (Swedish) Russian. (Western Sweden), and in 1749 - to the province of Skåne (Southern Sweden).
In 1750, Carl Linnaeus was appointed rector of Uppsala University.
The most significant publications of the 1750s:
Philosophia botanica (“Philosophy of Botany”, 1751) is a textbook of botany that was translated into many European languages and remained a model for other textbooks until the beginning of the 19th century.
Species plantarum ("Species of plants"). The date of publication of the work—May 1, 1753—is taken as the starting point for botanical nomenclature.
10th edition of Systema naturae ("System of Nature"). The publication date of this edition—January 1, 1758—is taken as the starting point for zoological nomenclature.
Amoenitates academicae (“Academic leisure”, 1751-1790). A collection of dissertations written by Linnaeus for his students and partly by the students themselves.
In 1758, Linnaeus acquired the farm Hammarby (Swedish: Hammarby) about ten kilometers southeast of Uppsala (now Linnaeus Hammarby). The country house in Hammarby became his summer estate.
In 1774, Linnaeus suffered his first stroke (cerebral hemorrhage), as a result of which he was partially paralyzed. In the winter of 1776-1777 there was a second blow. On December 30, 1777, Linnaeus became significantly worse, and on January 10, 1778, he died at his home in Uppsala.
As one of the prominent citizens of Uppsala, Linnaeus was buried in Uppsala Cathedral.
Apostles of Linnaeus
Main article: Apostles of Linnaeus
The apostles of Linnaeus were his students who participated in botanical and zoological expeditions in various parts of the world, starting in the late 1740s. The plans for some of them were developed by Linnaeus himself or with his participation. From their travels, most of the “apostles” brought or sent plant seeds, herbarium and zoological specimens to their teacher. The expeditions were associated with great dangers; Of the 17 disciples who are usually classified as “apostles,” seven died during their travels, among them was the first “apostle of Linnaeus,” Christopher Thernström (Swedish) Russian. (1703-1746). After his widow accused Linnaeus of the fact that it was his fault that her children would grow up orphans, he began to send on expeditions only those of his students who were unmarried.
Contribution to science
Linnaeus laid the foundations of modern binomial (binary) nomenclature, introducing into the practice of taxonomy the so-called nomina trivialia, which later began to be used as species epithets in the binomial names of living organisms. The method introduced by Linnaeus of forming a scientific name for each species is still used today (the previously used long names, consisting of a large number of words, gave a description of the species, but were not strictly formalized). The use of a two-word Latin name - the genus name, then the specific name - made it possible to separate nomenclature from taxonomy.
Carl Linnaeus is the author of the most successful artificial classification plants and animals, which became the basis for the scientific classification of living organisms. He shared natural world into three “kingdoms”: mineral, plant and animal, using four levels (“ranks”): classes, orders, genera and species.
He described about one and a half thousand new plant species (the total number of plant species he described was more than ten thousand) and big number species of animals.
Humanity owes the current Celsius scale partly to Linnaeus. Initially, the scale of the thermometer, invented by Linnaeus' colleague at Uppsala University, Professor Anders Celsius (1701-1744), had zero at the boiling point of water and 100 degrees at the freezing point. Linnaeus, who used thermometers to measure conditions in greenhouses and greenhouses, found this inconvenient and in 1745, after the death of Celsius, “turned over” the scale.
Linnaeus Collection
Carl Linnaeus left a huge collection, which included two herbariums, a collection of shells, a collection of insects and a collection of minerals, as well as a big library. “This is the greatest collection the world has ever seen,” he wrote to his wife in a letter that he willed to be published after his death.
After long family disagreements and contrary to the instructions of Carl Linnaeus, the entire collection went to his son, Carl Linnaeus the Younger (1741-1783), who moved it from the Hammarby Museum to his home in Uppsala and worked extremely hard to preserve the objects included in it (herbarium and the insect collection had already suffered from pests and dampness by that time). The English naturalist Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820) offered to sell his collection, but he refused.
But soon after sudden death Carl Linnaeus the Younger from a stroke in late 1783, his mother (the widow of Carl Linnaeus) wrote to Banks that she was ready to sell him the collection. He did not buy it himself, but convinced the young English naturalist James Edward Smith (1759-1828) to do so. Potential buyers were also Carl Linnaeus's student, Baron Claes Alströmer (1736-1894), Russian empress Catherine the Great, English botanist John Sibthorpe (English) Russian. (1758-1796) and others, but Smith turned out to be more efficient: having quickly approved the inventory sent to him, he approved the deal. Scientists and students at Uppsala University demanded that the authorities do everything to leave Linnaeus’s legacy in their homeland, but King Gustav III of Sweden was in Italy at the time, and government officials responded that they could not resolve this issue without his intervention...
In September 1784, the collection left Stockholm on an English brig and was soon safely delivered to England. The legend according to which the Swedes sent a warship to intercept an English brig carrying out the Linnaeus collection has no scientific basis, although it is depicted in an engraving from R. Thornton’s book “A New Illustration of the Linnaeus System.”
The collection received by Smith included 19 thousand herbarium sheets, more three thousand specimens of insects, more than one and a half thousand shells, over seven hundred specimens of corals, two and a half thousand specimens of minerals; the library consisted of two and a half thousand books, over three thousand letters, as well as manuscripts of Carl Linnaeus, his son and other scientists.
Linneanism
During his lifetime, Linnaeus gained worldwide fame; adherence to his teaching, conventionally called Linneanism, became widespread at the end of the 18th century. And although Linnaeus’s concentration in the study of phenomena on the collection of material and its further classification seems excessive from the point of view of today, and the approach itself seems very one-sided, for its time the activities of Linnaeus and his followers became very important. The spirit of systematization that permeated this activity helped biology in a fairly short time to become a full-fledged science and, in a sense, to catch up with physics, which was actively developing during the 18th century as a result of the scientific revolution.
In 1788, Smith founded the Linnean Society of London in London, whose purpose was declared to be “the development of science in all its manifestations,” including the preservation and development of Linnaeus’s teachings. Today this society is one of the most authoritative scientific centers, especially in the field of biological systematics. A significant part of the Linnaeus collection is still kept in the society's special repository (and is available to researchers).
Soon after London Society a similar society appeared in Paris - Société linnéenne de Paris (“Paris Linnean Society”) (French) Russian. Its heyday came in the first years after the Great French Revolution.
Later, similar Linnean societies (French) Russian. appeared in Australia, Belgium, Spain, Canada, USA, Sweden and other countries.
Honors
Even during his lifetime, Linnaeus was given metaphorical names that emphasized his unique significance for world science. He was called Princeps botanicorum (there are several translations into Russian - “First among botanists”, “Prince of botanists”, “Prince of botanists”), “Northern Pliny” (in this name Linnaeus is compared with Pliny the Elder, author of Natural History), “Second Adam,” as well as “Lord of Paradise” and “Giver of names to the animal world.” As Linnaeus himself wrote in one of his autobiographies, “from a small hut a great man can emerge.”
Awards and nobility
In 1753 Linnaeus became a Knight of the Order North Star- Swedish Order of Civil Merit.
On April 20, 1757, Linnaeus was granted the title of nobility; his name as a nobleman was now written Carl von Linné (the decision to raise him to the nobility was approved in 1761). The family coat of arms, which he invented for himself, had a shield divided into three parts, painted in three colors, black, green and red, symbolizing the three kingdoms of nature (minerals, plants and animals). There was an egg in the center of the shield. On top of the shield was entwined with a shoot of northern linnaea, the favorite plant of Carl Linnaeus. Under the shield was a motto in Latin: Famam extendere factis (“increase glory by deeds”).
Assignment to the son of a poor priest noble rank, even after he became a professor and famous scientist, was by no means an ordinary phenomenon in Sweden.
Named after Linnaeus
Taxa
Linnaea (Linnaea Gronov.) is a genus of northern evergreen creeping shrubs, later separated into a separate family Linnaeaceae (Raf.) Backlund. The plant was named after Linnaeus by the Dutch botanist Jan Gronovius. The only species of this genus, Linnaea borealis, is the official flower symbol of Linnaea's native province of Småland.
One of the largest-flowered hybrid varieties of peony (Paeonia) is ‘Linné’.
Linnaea mallow (Malva linnaei M.F.Ray). A type of annual or biennial grass with pink, blue or purple flowers native to the Mediterranean, and often found in the wild in Australia.
Linnaeus' hawthorn (Crataegus linnaeana Pojark.). A tree growing wild in southern Italy; as a fruit plant cultivated in the Western Mediterranean, including France
Linnea northern
Peony 'Linné'
Linnaeus and modernity
As a modern researcher of the life of Linnaeus, Professor G. Bruberg writes, Carl Linnaeus, who, despite his humble origins, became a world famous scientist, is “an important element of Swedish national mythology,” “a symbol of the entry of a poor and exhausted nation into the stage of maturity, strength and power.” . This attitude towards Linnaeus becomes all the more understandable since the scientist’s youth fell on the period when Sweden, along with the death of King Charles XII in 1718, lost its status as a great power.
In 2007, on the territory of the Skansen ethnographic park in Stockholm, on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the scientist’s birth, the “Linnaeus Trail” was created. It has 12 stops, including the Herb Garden (where you can find representatives of the various classes of the “sexual” system of Linnaeus’s classification system), the Krunan Pharmacy (dedicated to the medical stage in his life), as well as those areas of Skansen - “Sweden”, which Linnaeus visited at one time: Lapland, Central Sweden, Småland.
100 Swedish krona banknotes with a portrait of Linnaeus
The modern Swedish 100-krona banknote features a portrait of Linnaeus by Alexander Roslin (1775). On back side banknotes depict a bee pollinating a flower.
In the description of Linnaeus's scientific activity, during the biography itself, all of his main works on botany were described in some detail, and each of them was characterized separately. Very little was said about Linnaeus' work in the fields of zoology, mineralogy and medicine.
The significance of Linnaeus's works can be more clearly understood when considering them in connection with the general state of natural science at the beginning of his scientific activity.
Before moving on to this issue, it would be appropriate to familiarize yourself with Linnaeus’s own assessment of his own activities, following the example of how this was done when considering his individual works. Of exceptional interest in this regard is the chapter “Linnaei merita et inventa” published by Afzelius in his autobiography. We provide the translation of this chapter here.
Merits and discoveries of Linnaeus
He built botany from its foundations on a site that had previously been in ruins, so we can assume that since his time this science has taken on a completely different appearance and begun a new era.
- He indicated in exact terms first of all, the leaves of plants, thanks to which all descriptions of plants received a new look and lighting.
- He was the first to possess Plant Divination (Prolepsin Plantarum), a rare discovery in nature, in which traces of the Creator himself appear.
- He looked at the transformations (changes) of plants in a new way and thereby proved the basis of reproduction.
- He presented in a clear light the gender of plants, which had been subject to doubt, and showed the effect of pollen on the moisture content of the stigma.
- He constructed the Reproductive System as a result of countless observations of stamens and pistils in all plants, which had been neglected until that time.
- He first introduced into botany many Parts of reproduction under their proper names, such as Calyx, Perianth, Involucre, Scale, Wing, etc. Corolla and Nectaries, Anthers, Ovary, Style, Stigma, Pod and Bob, Drupe and Receptacle, in addition to many words, also Stipule and Bract, Arrow, Pedicel and Petiole.
- He described anew, in accordance with the number, appearance, position and proportionality of all parts of fruiting, the Genera, which were thought to be impossible to determine accurately enough - and they became recognized; he discovered twice as many genera as had been found by all the authors before him.
- He was the first to distinguish plant species by fundamental differences and also identified most Indian ones.
- He introduced for the first time in all natural science simple names, for its clarity and brevity.
- He reduced the varieties that swamped botany to their species.
- He added the habitat of plants (Loca plantarum) to the species as a basis for plant culture.
- He explored plant habitats (Stationes plantarum) as a basis for agriculture.
- He first developed the Flora Calendar as a guide for all activities in agriculture and from the Blossoming of the Trees he showed the time of sowing.
- He first saw and described the Flora Clock.
- He first discovered the Dream of Plants.
- He dared to talk about plant hybrids and gave posterity indications of the Cause of species (Specierum causam).
- He set Pan suecicus and Pandora suecica as works that should be continued by all layers of the people, since previously they did not know how to properly manage the economy. (These names refer to Linnaeus’ extensive work on the study of Swedish food plants.)
- He understood better than anyone else before him the generation of minerals and showed that crystals arise from salts and that hard stones come from soft (rocks), confirmed the decrease of water and proved 4 uplifts of land, not to mention the fact that he first established the true method in the mineral kingdom.
- He alone discovered more animals than all before him, and he was the very first to give their generic and specific characteristics using a natural method. He should be credited with knowledge of insects and their characteristics, not to mention the fact that he was the first to discover an artificial method for recognizing fish by their fins, mollusks by their shells, and snakes by their scutes. He classified whales as mammals, naked reptiles as amphibians, and separated worms from insects.
- He showed in physiology wildlife medullary (core) substance, endless in reproduction and multiplication; that it can never be reproduced in offspring except as belonging to the maternal organism; that what is reproduced according to the appearance of the body belongs to the father, and according to the medullary system belongs to the mother; as complex animals (Animalia composita) should be understood; and the brain is derived from electrical influences perceived through the lungs.
- In Pathology he gave the most distinct Symptoms of Diseases, based on the principles of Sauvage, but greatly improved; he awakened the idea of glandular infarction as a cause of painful deaths; he was the first to clearly see that Fever comes from an internal disease, spread by cold and contracted by heat, and he proved the contagiousness of living peelings of the skin. He was the first to correctly recognize tapeworms.
- He first introduced Dulcamara, Herb into practice among Swedish doctors. Brittanica, Senega, Spigelia, Cynomorium, Conyza, Linnaea.
- He was the first to show the properties of plants, substantiate with this the active principles of medicinal agents that had previously been mysterious, showed their mode of action and refuted the idea of toxicity among practitioners.
- He presented the diet according to own method, based on observations and experience, and gave it the form of experimental physics.
- He never neglected the economic use of plants, but collected [information about this] from the greatest attention with species that had previously only rarely been taken into account by naturalists.
- He discovered the Organization of Nature (Politia Naturae) or Divine Economy, and thereby opened the way for descendants into an immeasurable new region.
- He put Fauna in first place for science and was the first to explore the naturalities of the northern regions of Scandinavia down to the smallest; not to mention the fact that here in the country he established the first and largest Botanical Garden, which before him was not even worthy of mention, and that here he founded the first museum of animals in wine spirit.
Throughout the 16th and 17th centuries. scientific botany and zoology consisted most of all in a simple acquaintance with living organisms and describing them, listing them in one order or another. To the actual knowledge of plants and animals inhabiting European countries, more and more overseas ones were added over time. This is the increasing diversity of living organisms covered by the science of the time, in high degree contributed to the accumulation of factual knowledge of them and made their review more and more difficult over time.
IN early XVII V. Swiss botanist Caspar Baugin published a compendium (Pinax theatri botanici, 1623) of all then known plants, the total number of which was about six thousand. This work was of very great scientific importance in its time, as it summed up everything that had previously been done in the study of plants. It should be noted, however, that in our time this book is little understood by us, despite the fact that actual knowledge of plants has increased immeasurably over these centuries. Its low accessibility for readers of our time is explained by the fact that the descriptions of plants here are very often so inaccurate and confusing that it is often impossible to imagine from them the plant about which we're talking about. At the same time, the verbosity of the descriptions does not at all make it easier for the reader to form a clearer idea of the plant being described. Verbose plant names that are impossible to remember are also only in in rare cases can be understood.
This book and similar works of that time were very difficult for their contemporaries to use, precisely because of the inaccuracy of the description of plant organs, the vagueness of descriptive terms, the lack of generally understood plant names, etc. One can imagine the difficulties of 17th-century botanists who would like to compare plants, taken from nature, with descriptions of them in these works.
The plant, not recognized from such a code, was again described by other authors and, of course, also inexpressively and received a new cumbersome name. Thus, subsequent readers were put in an even more difficult position due to terminological vagueness and heteroglossia of the authors. The number of such descriptions increased over time and the accumulation of descriptive materials became increasingly chaotic.
The difficulties confronting naturalists in this connection were increased further by the fact that this multitude of vaguely characterized forms was very poorly classified. The need for classification was truly an extreme necessity at that time, since without it there was no possibility of reviewing the descriptive material. It must be said that the need to classify organisms at the level of science of that time was a purely logical necessity for the formal ordering of the forms being studied. Only in this way could the latter be placed within a certain framework that would allow them to be viewed.
There is no need to recall here the classifications of plants that have replaced one another over time. They, of course, gradually improved, but were very far from perfect, primarily due to the lack of clarity of their very basis and the fact that they could only be applied to high categories. The fruiticists, calicists or corollists were equally mistaken and fell into equal difficulties, primarily because they did not have a sufficiently clear idea of the characteristics of the plant organs on which their classifications were based, i.e., respectively, on the fruits, calyxes or corollas of flowers.
At the very end of the 17th century. and in the first years of the 18th century. Some advances were made in the practical delineation of plant genera (Tournefort) and in attempts to identify species (John Ray). Both were determined by the same logical necessity.
In this regard, the general situation in science improved, but only slightly, since the accumulation of descriptive material completely suppressed science and the material itself often did not fit into the classification framework. The situation in natural science became completely critical, and it already seemed that there was absolutely no way out.
Some reflection of this situation may be the definition of botany we mentioned, given by the famous Leiden professor Burgaw. He said: “Botany is a part of natural science through which plants are successfully and with the least difficulty learned and retained in memory.”
From this definition, the tasks facing botany of that time and the catastrophic state of terminology and nomenclature in it are completely clear. In essence, zoology was in the same position.
Linnaeus, perhaps more deeply than Burgaw, realized all this during his student years in Uppsala and set out to reform natural science.
We have already said that Linnaeus proceeded from the fact that “the basis of botany is the division and naming of plants,” that “Ariadne’s thread of botany is classification, without which there is chaos,” and “natural science itself is the division and naming of natural bodies.”
But before proceeding with the classification itself, it was necessary to do a lot of preparatory work, which, as was said, he coped brilliantly. This work is terminological reform and the creation of a universal classification scheme.
In the “Principles of Botany” a precise, very expressive and simple terminology was developed, and in the “System of Nature” and in the “Classes of Plants” a comprehensive sexual classification system was amazing in its elegance and simplicity. The completion of these works brought extremely rapid success. A strictly thought-out terminology and a simple classification scheme made it possible to delineate with previously unknown expressiveness about a thousand genera (“Genera plantarum”) and give unprecedented clarity in the characteristics of many hundreds of species (“Hortus Cliffortianus”, “Flora Lapponica”). In these works, as was previously said, the binomial nomenclature of polynomials was brought to perfection, precisely due to the fact that the category “genus” was defined.
The works of this period (1735-1738) completed most of Linnaeus's reform work, but only the first stage was achieved with regard to nomenclature.
As a result further work, by 1753, Linnaeus was able to “extend Ariadnine’s thread of taxonomy” to species, delineated this classification category with certainty, and in “Species plantarum” proposed in this regard a new nomenclatural technique - simple names, which became the basis of modern binomial nomenclature. We have already spoken about all this in sufficient detail. Here it is only appropriate to recall that the methodological basis of this work was the principles of Aristotelian logic concerning concepts, their classification, division, etc.
Linnaeus quite rightly credits himself with the creation of botany in the place of the chaos that preceded him.
We have seen that he developed terminology and a precise diagnostic language, he proposed a strict nomenclature, he developed a comprehensive and practically very convenient classification. Based on all this, he revised a huge amount of factual material previously accumulated by science. Having selected everything that was reliable and discarded the erroneous and doubtful, he systematized the previously obtained information, that is, he made it scientific.
It is appropriate to say here that some researchers, when assessing the work of Linnaeus, often say that he only “summarized the past, and did not outline the future,” or, what is the same, “wrote an epilogue, not a prologue.”
Before objecting to this, it should be pointed out that it is necessary to take into account that reform activities Linnea contributed exceptionally to progress research work and the accumulation of factual knowledge of organisms. Suffice it to say that in the half century that elapsed from the publication of Linnaeus’s most important works on botany (1753) and zoology (1758), the number of reliably known organisms more than doubled.
When they say that Linnaeus did not outline the future, but only summed up the past, they usually mean that he developed only an artificial plant system and did very little for the natural system. Linnaeus understood, as was said earlier, the need for a natural method and for his time did a lot in this regard. It must be said, however, that by the natural method in our time we mean a natural, or phylogenetic, system, completely forgetting at the same time that the natural method in the 18th century. is nothing more than establishing similarities between organisms and classifying them according to this principle. Then what was meant was similarity, and not kinship in the sense of common origin. The fact is that the idea of development was not yet known at that time. Having flashed in Kant’s “Theory of Heaven” (1755), it was only half a century later that it became the basis of cosmogony (the Kant-Laplace hypothesis). It took another half a century for it to manifest itself in all its greatness when applied to living nature in Darwin's evolutionary teachings.
Natural method of Linnaeus and natural classifications later authors of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. essentially did not differ. Their task is to establish similarities between organisms in order to comprehend the creative plan of the “creator”, expressed in the natural order of nature.
The desire to find the beginning of the evolutionary idea in the writings of Linnaeus is also unfounded, as are the reproaches against him for not being an evolutionist.
We should, of course, pay very close attention to § 16 of the list of his discoveries, from which we learn about Linnaeus’ deep interest in the question of the origin of species and his understanding of the extreme importance of this issue. A little later, in the thirteenth edition of Systema Naturae (1774), Linnaeus wrote the following: “... almighty God in the beginning, in moving from simple to complex and from small to many, at the beginning of plant life, created so many various plants, how many natural orders there are. That he himself then mixed these plants of the orders so much with each other by crossing that as many plants appeared as there were various distinct genera. That then Nature mixed these generic plants, through changing generations, but without changing the floral structures, mixed among themselves and multiplied into existing species, all possible hybrids should be excluded from this number of generations - after all, they are sterile.”
We see that creative role"creator" is now limited. It turns out that he created only representatives of the detachments (of which there were 116), which formed genera by hybrid mixing, and the latter by Hybridization, without the participation of a “creator,” was propagated by nature itself into existing species. It is appropriate to recall that forty years earlier Linnaeus wrote: “We count as many species as there are different forms that were first created.”
It is also known, based on the work of Linnaeus’s student, Giesecke, who outlined his teacher’s views on the issue of signs of natural orders, that Linnaeus dealt with these issues until his old age. He told Giesecke: “I have worked for a long time on the natural method, I have done what I could achieve, there is still more to be done, I will continue this as long as I live.”
The doctrine of sex in plants, strict organography, clear terminology, development of the reproductive system, reform of nomenclature, description of about one thousand two hundred genera of plants and the establishment of more than eight thousand species constitute the most important part botanical work of Linnaeus, but not the only one, as can be seen from his list.
He was widely involved in plant biology (“Flora’s Calendar”, “Flora’s Clock”, “Plant Dream”) and many practical issues, of which he particularly emphasized the study of Swedish forage plants. How wide his scientific interests were can be seen from the ten-volume collection of dissertations of his students (“Amoenitates Academicae”). Of the ninety botanical dissertations, almost half are represented by floristic-systematic topics; about a quarter is devoted to medicinal, food and economically useful plants; about a dozen relate to topics in plant morphology; several dissertations address various issues in plant biology; separate topics are devoted to plant habitats, botanical bibliography, terminology, scientific gardening, and one dissertation is devoted to a topic that has recently been extremely topical for us - the degeneration of cereals.
The significance of Linnaeus's work as a zoologist is almost as great as his botanical work, although he was most of all a botanist. His fundamental zoological works date back to the same Dutch period of activity and are especially associated with the work “Systema Naturae”. Although the classification of animals developed by him was in significant parts more natural than the botanical one, it was less successful and existed for a shorter period of time. We have already said earlier that the particular success of botanical classification was brought about by the fact that it was at the same time an extremely simple determinant. Linnaeus divided the animal kingdom into six classes: mammals, birds, reptiles (now reptiles and amphibians), fish, insects (now arthropods) and worms (many invertebrates, including worms).
A great classification achievement for that time was the precise definition of the class of mammals and the inclusion of whales in it, which even the father of ichthyology, Artedi, classified as fish.
What seems surprising in our time is that already in the first edition of Systema Naturae (1735), Linnaeus placed man among the anthropoids.
The very first edition of “System of Nature” gave impetus to the development of systematic zoology, since the classification scheme outlined here and the terminology and nomenclature developed facilitated descriptive work.
Increasing from edition to edition, this section of “Systems of Nature” reached 823 pages in the tenth edition, published in 1758 and remarkable in that it consistently carried out the binomial nomenclature of organisms, and therefore this edition is the starting point in modern zoological nomenclature.
Linnaeus worked especially hard on the classification of insects, and he described most genera and about two thousand species (twelfth edition 1766-1768). He also developed the foundations of organography, and in a special essay “Foundation of Entomology” (1767) he outlined the body structure of this class of animals. In parallel with “Flora of Sweden,” Linnaeus wrote “Fauna of Sweden,” the significance of which for faunistics was the same as the publication of his “Flora” had for floristic works. Subsequent works on fauna were written on the model of how it was done by Linnaeus in The Fauna of Sweden.
Being engaged in the art of assay, as applied mineralogy, the search for minerals, the study of mineral springs, caves, mines, the study of crystals and the classification of stones - lithology, Linnaeus was not only completely at the level of his time in matters related to this, but greatly advanced the development of some of them forward . Geologists believe that if he had not written anything other than those related to paleontology and geology, his name would have been glorified anyway.
In the “Museum Tessinianum”, among other things, trilobites were described, which marked the beginning of the study of this group of fossil crustaceans, and in a special work “On Baltic Corals” he described and depicted the corals of the Baltic Sea.
In connection with the study of both, he correctly understood the significance of fossils for establishing the distant past of the land, just as he correctly assessed the significance of the last marine terraces for a more recent time. From his descriptions of the outcrops, with their alternating layers, it can be seen that he was deeply interested in the emergence sedimentary rocks("System of Nature", 1768). In addition to the classification of minerals, he also gave a classification of crystals; the collection of the latter in his museum amounted to one and a half hundred natural specimens.
A doctor by training and at the beginning of his career practical activities, Linnaeus enjoyed extreme popularity in Stockholm as a practicing physician in the years 1739-1741, while at the same time being the head of the Admiralty Hospital. When he moved to Uppsala, he almost left his medical practice. As a professor who taught three medical courses, he was extremely popular. These courses are “Materia medica” (“The study of medicinal substances”), “Semiotica” (“Semiologia” - “The study of the signs of diseases”) and “Diaeta naturalis” (“The study of nutrition”).
In connection with the reading of these courses, Linnaeus wrote detailed study guides. “Materia medica” was previously discussed in detail, and here it is only sufficient to recall that this work of Linnaeus (1749) became a classic guide to pharmacology.
The work “Genera Morborum” (“Generations of Diseases,” 1759) is a classification of diseases according to their symptoms. The basis of the classification was borrowed by Linnaeus from the work of the French physician and naturalist Sauvage, slightly revised and expanded. In total, eleven classes of diseases have been identified here. The purpose of this book is to provide guidance for recognizing diseases by their external manifestations.
The book “Clavis Medicinae duplex” (“Double Key to Medicine”, 1766), which Linnaeus valued extremely highly, outlines his lecture notes and data on general pathology and therapy.
Linnaeus's lectures on dietetics were particularly successful, and this course itself was perhaps his most favorite. Begun by him back in 1734, in the form of rough notes, it was supplemented and expanded more and more over the course of decades. These lectures were not published during Linnaeus's lifetime. The success of the course among students may have been increased by the fact that, in addition to setting out the rules of therapeutic nutrition and everything related to this, the professor provided a lot of sanitary and hygienic information, advice and purely practical instructions regarding everyday life, etc.
Linnaeus's personal merits in practical medicine were the introduction of certain remedies into medical practice plant origin, partly preserved in the modern pharmacopoeia, as well as the development of a method for combating tapeworms.
Speaking about the significance of Linnaeus’s work as a physician, one cannot help but point out what is usually associated with his name - the beginning of the study of animal diseases. Linnaeus paid some attention to this during his Lapland trip, being interested in damage to the skin of deer. One of his students later became the first veterinarian in Sweden.
In conclusion, it should be said that Linnaeus, with his reforms and organizing influence, determined the development of the main directions in botany and zoology for decades.