Wilhelm Friedrich von Karwinsky von Karwin

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Wilhelm Friedrich von Karwinsky von Karwin , also Karwinski or Karvinsky , (born February 19, 1780 in Keszthely , Kingdom of Hungary , † March 2, 1855 in Munich , Kingdom of Bavaria ) was a German- Austrian botanist . He collected in Brazil and Mexico. Its official botanical author's abbreviation is “ Karw. "

Live and act

Karwinsky von Karwin came from a noble family, his mother (1754-1816) was a daughter of Wilhelm Friedrich von Gleichen-Rußwurm (1717-1773), his father († 1814) was a Habsburg military. He studied in Vienna for the profession of mining engineer, which he also practiced for a while in Spain. After inheriting property in Bavaria, he moved to Munich in 1815. He collected in Brazil from 1821 to 1823 and was in Mexico from 1827 to 1832, where he worked for a German-American mining company from Düsseldorf and collected plants for the Bavarian State Collections. In Mexico he was mainly in the province of Oaxaca and sent many live agaves and cacti to Munich. Like orchids, cacti fetched high prices from collectors in the 19th century. For example, Karwinsky von Karwin sold a rare specimen of Ariocarpus kotschoubeyanus in 1842 for 1000 francs, which was much more than its weight in gold.

Ariocarpus kotschoubeyanus

From 1840 to 1843 he was again in Mexico, where he collected for the Russian government and sent the finds to Saint Petersburg. He teamed up with the Danish collector Frederik Liebmann (1813–1856).

Honors

In 1816 he became an honorary member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences .

Various taxa are named in his honor, for example the genus Karwinskia Zucc. from the family of the buckthorn plants (Rhamnaceae) and the Mexican fleabane ( Erigeron karvinskianus ).

literature

  • Rogers McVaugh: Karwinski's itineraries in Mexico 1827-1832 and 1840-1843, Contrib. Univ. Michigan Herbarium, Vol. 14, 1980, pp. 141-152, Archives

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Royal Bavarian Academy of Sciences: Scholarly advertisements. Volume 40-41, No. 4, July 1855, Col. 40.
  2. ^ Member entry of Wilhelm Friedrich Baron Karwinski von Karwin at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences , accessed on February 3, 2016.
  3. ↑ Lotte Burkhardt: Directory of eponymous plant names . Extended Edition. Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin, Free University Berlin Berlin 2018. [1]
personal data
SURNAME Karwinsky von Karwin, Wilhelm Friedrich von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German botanist
DATE OF BIRTH February 19, 1780
PLACE OF BIRTH Keszthely
DATE OF DEATH March 2, 1855
Place of death Munich