George Henry Kendrick Thwaites

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George Henry Kendrick Thwaites (born July 9, 1812 in Bristol , † September 11, 1882 in Kandy , Sri Lanka) was a British botanist . He was director of the Botanical Garden in Peradeniya on Ceylon . Its official botanical author abbreviation is " Thwaites ".

Live and act

Thwaites was first an accountant and in his spare time he studied botany, especially cryptogams and algae , which he observed under a microscope. In 1839 he became secretary of the Botanical Society of London for Bristol. He showed that diatoms are plants and not animals, which gave him a reputation. J. François Camille Montagne dedicated the naming of the genus Thwaitesia to him in 1845 . In 1846 he became a lecturer in botany at the Bristol School of Pharmacy and then at the Medical School in Bristol. An application for a chair in natural history at one of the newly established Queen's Colleges in Ireland was unsuccessful. In 1849 he succeeded the late George Gardner as director of the Botanical Garden in Peradeniya (initially as superintendent, from 1857 as director). In 1880 he gave up the post for health reasons. He was succeeded by Henry Trimen .

He wrote a monograph on the plants of Ceylon and also dealt with flowering plants and entomology and in Ceylon with different cultivated plants. He introduced the cultivation of cinchona trees in Ceylon. He contributed to the monograph on the butterflies of Ceylon by Frederic Moore (Lepidoptera of Ceylon, 3 volumes, 1880 to 1889).

For his book on Ceylon plants, he became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1865 and received an honorary doctorate from the Leopoldina . In 1854 he became a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London . In 1878 he became Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George.

Honors

William Jackson Hooker named the climbing plant genus Kendrickia from the family of the black- mouthed plants (Melastomataceae) after him. The algae genus Thwaitesia Mont. And the mushroom genus Thwaitesiella Massee have also been named in his honor.

Fonts (selection)

  • Together with Sir Joseph Dalton-Hooker: Enumeratio Plantarum Zeylaniæ , 5 volumes, 1859–1864
  • Reports on the Royal Botanic Garden, Peradenia . 1856-1867

Web links

References and comments

  1. ↑ Vital dates according to Ray Desmond, Dictionary Of British And Irish Botantists And Horticulturalists, Natural History Museum, Taylor and Francis 1994
  2. ↑ a b Lotte Burkhardt: Directory of eponymic plant names - extended edition. Part I and II. Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin , Freie Universität Berlin , Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-946292-26-5 doi: 10.3372 / epolist2018 .
  3. ↑ Walter Erhardt among others: The great pikeperch. Encyclopedia of Plant Names . Volume 2, page 2065. Verlag Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2008. ISBN 978-3-8001-5406-7
personal data
SURNAME Thwaites, George Henry Kendrick
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British botanist
DATE OF BIRTH July 9, 1812
PLACE OF BIRTH Bristol
DATE OF DEATH September 11, 1882
Place of death Kandy