Spiridon Brusina

Sculpture in Zadar.

Spiridon (Špiro) Brusina (born December 11, 1845 in Zadar , Austria-Hungary , today Croatia ; † May 21, 1908 in Zagreb , Austria-Hungary, today Croatia) was an Austro-Hungarian or Croatian naturalist , founder of zoology , Malacology , marine and evolutionary biology and paleontology in Croatia and member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts . He founded the Department of Zoology at the University of Zagreb . Brusina was also the director of the Zoological Museum in Zagreb.

After high school in his hometown, he studied at the University of Vienna , at that time a meeting place for Croatian intellectuals such as Frane Bulić , Dimitrije Demeter , Vatroslav Jagić , Franjo Rački . He described over six hundred neogene species of living and extinct molluscs , birds, and mammals, as well as seventy newer Adriatic and several dozen newer land and freshwater species or subspecies. He wrote numerous monographs on certain species in Croatian regions, discovered neogene genera and tried in 1886 to represent the entire mollusc fauna in Austria-Hungary. In Zadar he began exploring the seabed in the city harbor on July 1, 1868. The day is considered the birthday of Croatian marine biology.

Brusina initially organized ornithological observations and, with the help of Milutin Barac, published a comprehensive local ornithological collection of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. He initiated the first Croatian scientific study of the Adriatic (1894), promoted the dissemination of Darwin's evolutionary ideas (he corresponded with Darwin and kept the Darwin letter of 1869) and advocated the establishment of a scientific institute for marine biology on the Adriatic coast. He advocated the establishment of the Zagreb Zoo , was a co-founder of the Croatian Natural History Society (1885) and founder of the scientific journal Priroda (Nature).

Selected Works

Brusina described the following taxa: Drobacia (1904), Emmericia (1870), Erjavecia (1870), Manzonia (1870), Spelaeodiscus (1886), Vidovicia (1904) and Trochulus erjaveci (1870).

• Conchiglie dalmate inedite . Negotiations of the kk zoological-botanical society in Vienna, 1865, 15, pp. 1–42.
• Contribuzione pella Fauna dei molluschi dalmati . Vienna, 1866.
• The fauna of the Agram congregation layers in Croatia . Vienna, 1884.
• The Neritodonta of Dalmatia and Slavonia along with all kinds of malacological remarks . Yearbooks of the German Malakozoological Society (Frankfurt am Main), 1884, 11, pp. 17–121.
• About the mollusc fauna of Austria-Hungary . Communications from the Natural Science Association for Styria (Graz), 1886, 22, pp. 29–56.
• Iconographia Molluscorum fossilium in telure tertiaria Hungariae, Croatiae, Slavoniae, Dalmatiae, Bosniae, Herzegoviniae, Serbiae et Bulgariae inventorum . Zagrabiae (Zagreb), 1902.

literature

• Balabanić, Josip: BRUSINA, Spiridon (Špiro) in: Croatian Bibliographical Lexicon , Lexicographical Institute Miroslav Krleža , Zagreb, 1989. ( Weblink )
• Kekez, Hrvoje: Najveći hrvatski znanstvenici (The Greatest Croatian Scientists), Mozaik knjiga, Zagreb, 2011.
• Kochansky-Devidé, V .: Prilozi povijesti geoloških znanosti, II. Spiridion Brusina, Geološki vjesnik 28 (1975), pp. 377-385.
• Skoko, Božo: Hrvatski velikani (Croatian greats), Večernji edicija, Zagreb, 2014, p. 299.
• Švoger, Vlasta: Croatian intellectuals - Viennese students - in the 19th century. Some case studies in: Kalapurić, Marijan; Lacković, Igor; Manestar, Anamarija: The Croats at the University of Vienna. 650 Years University of Vienna , Croatian Academic Association Austria and Croatian Historical Institute Vienna / Zagreb, Vienna, 2016, pp. 19–51. ( Web link )

Web links

Commons : Spiridion Brusina  - collection of images, videos and audio files