Johann Gottlieb Georgi (31 December 1729 – 27 October 1802) was a German

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

, naturalist and

geographer A geographer is a physical scientist, social scientist or humanist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society, including how society and nature interacts. The Greek prefix "geo" means "earth" a ...

. A native of

Pomerania Pomerania ( pl, Pomorze; german: Pommern; Kashubian: ''Pòmòrskô''; sv, Pommern) is a historical region on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea in Central Europe, split between Poland and Germany. The western part of Pomerania belongs to ...

, Georgi accompanied both

Johan Peter Falk Johan Peter Falk (26 November 1732 – 31 March 1774) was a Swedish botanist and an apostle of Carl Linnaeus. His first name is sometimes spelled "Johann"; his middle name is sometimes spelled "Pehr"; and his surname is sometimes spelled "Falck". ...

and

Peter Simon Pallas Peter Simon Pallas FRS FRSE (22 September 1741 – 8 September 1811) was a Prussian zoologist and botanist who worked in Russia between 1767 and 1810. Life and work Peter Simon Pallas was born in Berlin, the son of Professor of Surgery ...

on their respective journeys through

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part ...

. During 1770-1774 he travelled on its behalf to

Astrakhan Astrakhan ( rus, Астрахань, p=ˈastrəxənʲ) is the largest city and administrative centre of Astrakhan Oblast in Southern Russia. The city lies on two banks of the Volga, in the upper part of the Volga Delta, on eleven islands of the ...

, the

Urals The Ural Mountains ( ; rus, Ура́льские го́ры, r=Uralskiye gory, p=ʊˈralʲskʲɪjə ˈɡorɨ; ba, Урал тауҙары) or simply the Urals, are a mountain range that runs approximately from north to south through western ...

, Bashkir, the

Barabinsk Barabinsk (russian: Бара́бинск) is a town in Novosibirsk Oblast, Russia, located in the Baraba steppe on the Trans-Siberian Railway between Omsk and Novosibirsk. Population: History It was founded at the end of the 19th century and was ...

steppe In physical geography, a steppe () is an ecoregion characterized by grassland plains without trees apart from those near rivers and lakes. Steppe biomes may include: * the montane grasslands and shrublands biome * the temperate gras ...

, the Kolyvanskoe silver mines (to assess the ore content), Altai,

Tomsk Tomsk ( rus, Томск, p=tomsk, sty, Түң-тора) is a city and the administrative center of Tomsk Oblast in Russia, located on the Tom River. Population: Founded in 1604, Tomsk is one of the oldest cities in Siberia. The city is a n ...

Irkutsk Irkutsk ( ; rus, Иркутск, p=ɪrˈkutsk; Buryat and mn, Эрхүү, ''Erhüü'', ) is the largest city and administrative center of Irkutsk Oblast, Russia. With a population of 617,473 as of the 2010 Census, Irkutsk is the 25th-larges ...

Baikal Lake Baikal (, russian: Oзеро Байкал, Ozero Baykal ); mn, Байгал нуур, Baigal nuur) is a rift lake in Russia. It is situated in southern Siberia, between the Federal subjects of Russia, federal subjects of Irkutsk Oblast, I ...

, and Dauren. In 1783 he became an academician of the

Russian Academy of Sciences The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; russian: Росси́йская акаде́мия нау́к (РАН) ''Rossíyskaya akadémiya naúk'') consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across t ...

St Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

. Georgi was particularly interested in the Baikal region. Based on collections from far eastern Russia, in his 1775 publication ''Bemerkungen einer Reise im Russischen Reich im Jahre 1772'', Georgi provided the first botanical descriptions of many of the region's flowering plants, among them the Baikal skullcap (''Scutellaria baicalensis''). Many of these plants and herbs were later collected by European botanists in

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...

, and thereafter became rare specimens in European botanical gardens. After his fellow botanist and travelling companion Falk took his own life in 1774, Georgi edited his notes, which were published in Germany from 1785 to 1786 as ''Beyträge zur topographischen Kenntniss des Russischen Reichs I – III''. In 1790, Georgi's description and urban plans of the city of St. Petersburg was published in German. It appeared in a second edition in

Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the ...

in 1793 and was finally translated into Russian a year later. His ''Geographisch-physikalische und naturhistorische Beschreibung des Russischen Reichs'', a six volume edition of the geography and natural history of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...

, was published in

Königsberg Königsberg (, ) was the historic Prussian city that is now Kaliningrad, Russia. Königsberg was founded in 1255 on the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teutonic Knights during the Northern Crusades, and was ...

, Germany, from 1797 to 1802. Georgi also translated many works of

Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

Literature

* Vera Shirokova, Alexey Sobisevich, 'Illustrations from Academic Expeditions in Russia: The works of Falck and Georgi', iLINNAEUS , iMagazine , iStories (December 2015) https://www.ikfoundation.org/ilinnaeus/istories/verashirokova.php

References

1729 births 1802 deaths 18th-century German botanists German geographers Geographers from the Russian Empire Explorers from the Russian Empire German ornithologists Full members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences People from the Province of Pomerania {{Geographer-stub

Literature

See also

References