Georg Marcgrave
Georg Marcgrave (originally German: Georg Marggraf, also spelled "Marcgraf" "Markgraf") (1610 – 1644) was a German naturalist and astronomer, whose posthumously published Historia Naturalis Brasiliae was a major contribution to early modern science.[1]
Life
[edit | edit source]Born in Liebstadt in the Electorate of Saxony, Marcgrave studied botany, astronomy, mathematics, and medicine in Germany and Switzerland until 1636 when he journeyed to Leiden in the Netherlands.
In 1637, he was appointed astronomer of a company being formed to sail to the Dutch Brazil. He was accompanied by Willem Piso, a physician. He afterward entered the service of Dutch Brazil's governor, Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen, whose patronage provided him with the means of exploring a considerable part of Brazil.[2] He arrived in Brazil in early 1638 and undertook the first zoological, botanical, and astronomical expedition there, exploring various parts of the colony to study its natural history and geography. Traveling later to the coast of Guinea, where he fell victim to the local climate.[2]
Publications
[edit | edit source]His large map of Brazil, an important event in cartography, was published in 1647. According to Cuvier, Marcgrave was the most able and most precise of all those who described the natural history of remote countries during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
He was the co-author (with Willem Piso) of Historia Naturalis Brasiliae,[3] a single volume work on the botany and zoology of Brazil, that has had lasting influence in the history of science.
References
[edit | edit source]- ^ Neil Safier, "Beyond Brazilian Nature: The Editorial Itineraries of Marcgraf and Piso's Historia Naturalis Brasiliae" in Michiel Van Groesen, ed. The Legacy of Dutch Brazil. New York: Cambridge University Press 2014, pp. 168-186.
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- ^ Facsimile of original 1648 manuscript
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External links
[edit | edit source]
- Account of Piso and Marcgrave to promote sale of a digitalized version of Historia Naturalis Brasiliae.
Further reading
[edit | edit source]- Darmstaedter, L. (1928) Georg Marcgrave und Wilhelm Piso, die ersten Erforscher Brasiliens, Velhagen Klasings Monatshefte. 1928. pp. 649–654.
- Holthuis, L.B. (1991) Marcgraf's (1648) Brazilian Crustacea Zoologische Verhandelingen, Vol. 268 p. 1-123 PDF
- Whitehead, P.J.P. (1979) "The biography of Georg Marcgraf (1610–1643/4) by his brother Christian, translated by James Petiver" in J. Soc. Biblphy nat. Hist., 9:301–314.
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- 1610 births
- 1644 deaths
- People from Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge
- Scientists from the Electorate of Saxony
- 17th-century German astronomers
- 17th-century German naturalists
- Expatriates from the Holy Roman Empire
- Sailors on ships of the Dutch West India Company
- 17th-century German explorers
- Explorers of South America
- 17th-century Dutch cartographers
- People from Dutch Brazil