Linnaeus was born in 1707, the son of a Lutheran
clergyman, at Rashult in Sweden. He began to study medicine at the
University of Lund in 1727, transferring to the University of Uppsala the
following year. Linnaeus headed an expedition to Lapland in 1732,
travelling 4,600 miles and crossing the Scandinavian Peninsula by foot to
the Arctic Ocean. On the journey he discovered a hundred botanical
species. In 1734, he mounted another expedition to central Sweden. He
undertook his medical degree in 1735 at the University of Harderwijk in
Gelre, the Netherlands (which no longer exists), thence going to the
University of Leiden for further studies. Also in 1735, he published
Systema Naturae, his classification of plants based on their sexual parts.
His method of binomial nomenclature using genus and species names was
further expounded when he published Fundamenta Botanica (1736) and
Classes Plantarum (1738). This system used the flower and the number and
arrangements of its sexual organs of stamens and pistils to group plants
into twenty-four classes which in turn are divided into orders, genera
and species.
In his publications, Linnaeus provided a concise, usable survey of all
the world's plants and animals as then known, about 7,700 species of
plants and 4,400 species of animals. These works helped to establish and
standardize the consistent binomial nomenclature for species which he
introduced on a world scale for plants in 1753, and for animals in 1758,
and which is used today. His Systema Naturae 10th edition, volume
1(1758), has accordingly been accepted by international agreement as the
official starting point for zoological nomenclature. Scientific names
published before then have no validity unless adopted by Linnaeus or by
later authors. This confers a high scientific importance on the specimens
used by Linnaeus for their preparation, many of which are in his personal
collections now treasured by the Linnean Society. |
