Mark Catesby

Plate from Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (1731–1743).

Mark Catesby (* 3. April 1683 (possibly 24 March 1682);. † December 1749 ) was an English naturalist . Its official botanical author abbreviation is " Catesby ".

Between 1731 and 1743 he published his Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands , the first collection on the flora and fauna of North America, with 220 etchings of birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, insects and mammals.

Live and act

Catesby was baptized in Castle Hedingham , Essex , where he may have been born. His father was a lawyer . A family friend, John Ray , sparked Catesby's interest in natural history, which he later studied in London . After completing his studies, he moved to Williamsburg (Virginia) with his sister in 1712 . The money for this came from the inheritance of his father, who died in 1706. In 1714 he traveled to the West Indies . In 1719 he returned to England.

He collected seeds and plant parts in Virginia, which he sent to Thomas Fairchild in Hoxton , which made Catesby known in English science. The Royal Society financed an expedition to Carolina for him in 1722 . He settled in Charleston and traveled all over eastern North America and the Caribbean, collecting plants and birds. He sent this to Hans Sloane until he returned to England in 1726.

For the next 16 years, Catesby worked on his Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands , the publication of which was then funded by the Royal Society and especially by Peter Collinson . Catesby was the first to use full-page color picture panels in a book of natural history. He etched the panels himself. The first 18 panels had no background, but then Catesby began to combine images of plants and animals. The first volume was completed in 1731. Another volume appeared in 1743. Catesby died shortly before Christmas 1749 and was buried on December 23rd.

On April 26, 1733 he was elected to the Royal Society.

Carl von Linné adopted a lot of information from natural history in the 10th edition of his Systema Naturae (1758).

Honor taxon

Linnaeus named in his honor the genus Catesbea the plant family Rubiaceae (Rubiaceae).

literature

• Christine E. Jackson : Bird Etchings. The Illustrators and Their Books, 1655-1855 . ISBN 0801496845
• Michael Walters: A Concise History of Ornithology . ISBN 1873403976

Individual evidence

1. ^ Carl von Linné: Critica Botanica Leiden 1737, p. 92
2. ↑ Carl von Linné: Genera Plantarum . Leiden 1742, p. 43

Web links

• Author entry and list of described plant names for Mark Catesby at the IPNI
• Correspondence between Mark Catesby and Carl von Linné
• Entry to Catesby; Mark (1683-1749) in the Royal Society Archives , London
• Scan from Hortus Europae Americanus (1767)
• Scan from The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and Bahama Island Volume 1 , Volume 2