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CANDOLLE, AUGUSTIN PYRAME DE (1778—1841)

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Originally appearing in Volume V05, Page 181 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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CANDOLLE, AUGUSTIN PYRAME DE (1778—1841) , Swiss botanist, was See also:born at See also:Geneva on the 4th of See also:February 1778. He was descended from one of the See also:ancient families of See also:Provence, whence his ancestors had been expatriated for their See also:religion in the See also:middle of the 16th See also:century. Though a weakly boy he showed See also:great aptitude for study, and distinguished himself at school by his rapid attainments in classical and See also:general literature, and specially by a See also:faculty for See also:writing elegant See also:verse. He began his scientific studies at the See also:college of Geneva, where the teaching of J. P. E. Vaucher first inspired him with the determination to make botanical See also:science the See also:chief pursuit of his See also:life. In 1796 he removed to See also:Paris. His first productions, Historia Plantarum Succulentarum(4 vols., 1799) and Astragalogia (1802), introduced him to the See also:notice of See also:Cuvier, for whom he acted as See also:deputy at the College de See also:France in 1802, and to 1. B. See also:Lamarck, who afterwards confided to him the publication of the third edition of the Flore frangaise (1803—1815). The Principes elementaires de botanique, printed as the introduction to this See also:work, contained the first exposition of his principle of See also:classification according to the natural as opposed to. the Linnean or artificial method.

In 1804 he was granted the degree of See also:

doctor of See also:medicine by the medical faculty of Paris, and published his Essai sur !es proprietes medicales See also:des plantes comparees avec leurs formes exlerieures et See also:leer classification naturelle, and soon after, in 1806, his Synopsis plantarum in See also:flora Gallica descriptarum. At the See also:desire of the See also:French See also:government he spent the summers of the following six years in making a botanical and agricultural survey of the whole See also:kingdom, the results of which were published in 1813. In 1807 he was appointed See also:professor of See also:botany in the medical faculty of the university of See also:Montpellier, and in 1810 he was transferred to the newly founded See also:chair of botany of the faculty of sciences in the same university. From Montpellier, where he published his Theorie elementaire de la botanique (1813), he removed to Geneva in 1816, and in the following See also:year was invited by the now See also:independent See also:republic to fill the newly created chair of natural See also:history. The See also:rest of his life was spent in an See also:attempt to elaborate and See also:complete his " natural " See also:system of botanical classification. The results of his labours in this See also:department are to be found in his Regni vegetabilis systems taturale, of which two volumes only were completed (1821) when he found that it would be impossible for him to execute the whole work on so extensive a See also:scale. Accordingly in 1824 he began a less extensive work of the same kind—his Prodromus systematis regni vegetabilis—but even of this he was able to finish only seven volumes, or two-thirds of the whole. He had been for several years in delicate See also:health when he died on the 9th of See also:September 1841 at Geneva. His son, See also:ALPHONSE See also:LOUIS See also:PIERRE PYRAME DE CANDOLLE, born at Paris on the 28th of See also:October 18o6, at first devoted himself to the study of See also:law, but gradually drifted to botany and finally succeeded to his See also:father's chair. He published a number of botanical See also:works, including continuations of the Prodromus in collaboration with his son, See also:Anne Casimir Pyrame de Candolle. He died at Geneva on the 4th of See also:April 1893.

End of Article: CANDOLLE, AUGUSTIN PYRAME DE (1778—1841)

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