Heinrich Ernst Beyrich (31 August 1815 – 9 July 1896) was a German

palaeontologist Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of foss ...

Life

Born in Berlin, he was educated at the university in that city, and afterwards at

Bonn The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ru ...

, where he studied under

Georg August Goldfuss Georg August Goldfuss (Goldfuß, 18 April 1782 – 2 October 1848) was a German palaeontologist, zoologist and botanist. Goldfuss was born at Thurnau near Bayreuth. He was educated at Erlangen, where he graduated PhD in 1804 and became profes ...

and Johann Jakob Nöggerath. He obtained his degree of Ph.D. in 1837 at Berlin, and was subsequently employed in the mineralogical museum of the university, becoming director of the palaeontological collection in 1857, and director of the museum in 1875. In 1948 Ernst Beyrich married

Clementine Helm Clementine Helm Beyrich (9 October 1825, Delitzsch – 26 November 1896, Berlin) was a widely read author of books for children and young adults who published her works during the period of the German Empire. Life Early years Clementine Helm ...

, who later became famous as author of numerous books for children and

Young adult fiction Young adult fiction (YA) is a category of fiction written for readers from 12 to 18 years of age. While the genre is primarily targeted at adolescents, approximately half of YA readers are adults. The subject matter and genres of YA correlate ...

. Clementine was the niece of his professor

Christian Samuel Weiss Christian Samuel Weiss (26 February 1780 – 1 October 1856) was a German mineralogist born in Leipzig. Following graduation, he worked as a physics instructor in Leipzig from 1803 until 1808. and in the meantime, conducted geological studies of ...

. The couple had no children of its own, but adopted Clementine's two nieces, after the death of her sister in 1951. He was one of the founders of the German Geological Society in 1848. He early recognized the value of palaeontology in

stratigraphical Stratigraphy is a branch of geology concerned with the study of rock layers ( strata) and layering (stratification). It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks. Stratigraphy has three related subfields: lithostrat ...

work, and conducted important research in the

Rhenish The Rhineland (german: Rheinland; french: Rhénanie; nl, Rijnland; ksh, Rhingland; Latinised name: ''Rhenania'') is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly its middle section. Term Historically, the Rhinelands ...

mountains and in the

Harz The Harz () is a highland area in northern Germany. It has the highest elevations for that region, and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia. The name ''Harz'' derives from the Middle High German ...

and

Alpine Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to: Places Europe * Alps, a European mountain range ** Alpine states, which overlap with the European range Australia * Alpine, New South Wales, a Northern Village * Alpine National P ...

districts. In later years he gave special attention to the

Cenozoic The Cenozoic ( ; ) is Earth's current geological era, representing the last 66million years of Earth's history. It is characterised by the dominance of mammals, birds and flowering plants, a cooling and drying climate, and the current configu ...

strata In geology and related fields, a stratum ( : strata) is a layer of rock or sediment characterized by certain lithologic properties or attributes that distinguish it from adjacent layers from which it is separated by visible surfaces known as e ...

, including the

Brown coal Lignite, often referred to as brown coal, is a soft, brown, combustible, sedimentary rock formed from naturally compressed peat. It has a carbon content around 25–35%, and is considered the lowest rank of coal due to its relatively low heat ...

of North Germany. In 1854 he proposed the term

Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch of the Paleogene Period and extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the epoch are well identified but t ...

for certain

Tertiary Tertiary ( ) is a widely used but obsolete term for the geologic period from 66 million to 2.6 million years ago. The period began with the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, at the start ...

strata (now

Paleogene The Paleogene ( ; also spelled Palaeogene or Palæogene; informally Lower Tertiary or Early Tertiary) is a geologic period and system that spans 43 million years from the end of the Cretaceous Period million years ago ( Mya) to the beginning o ...

) intermediate between the

Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the modern Cenozoic Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''ēṓs'', ...

and

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...

, a term that has now been officially adopted. In 1865 he was appointed professor of geology and palaeontology at Berlin University, where he was eminently successful as a teacher. When the Prussian Geological Survey was instituted in 1873, he was appointed co-director with Wilhelm Hauchecorne (1828-1900). He published ''Beitragezur Kenntniss der Versteinerun gen des rheinischen Ubergangs-gebirges'' (1837); ''Uber einige hohmische Trilobiten'' (1845); ''Die Conchylien des norddeutschen Tertiargebirges'' (1853-1857). He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

in 1884. He died in July 1896.

References

;Attribution *

Life

References

Further reading