Josephus Nicolaus Laurenti (4 December 1735, Vienna – 17 February 1805, Vienna) was an
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
n
naturalist and
zoologist of
Italian origin.
Laurenti is considered the
auctor of the
class Reptilia (
reptiles) through his authorship of ' (1768) on the poisonous function of
reptiles and
amphibians. This was an important book in
herpetology, defining thirty genera of reptiles;
Carl Linnaeus
Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his Nobility#Ennoblement, ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalise ...
's
10th edition
1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. ...
of ''
Systema Naturae'' in 1758 defined only ten genera. ''Specimen Medicum'' contains a description of the blind salamander (amphibian): ''
Proteus anguinus
The olm or proteus (''Proteus anguinus'') is an aquatic salamander in the family Proteidae, the only exclusively cave-dwelling chordate species found in Europe. In contrast to most amphibians, it is entirely aquatic, eating, sleeping, and br ...
'', purportedly collected from cave waters in
Slovenia
Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...
(or possibly western
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
); this description represented one of the first published accounts of a cave animal in the western world, although ''Proteus anguinus'' was not recognized as a cave animal at the time.
External links
*
Specimen Medicum, Exhibens Synopsin Reptilium Emendatam cum Experimentis circa Venena' a
Göttinger Digitalisierungszentrum
1735 births
1805 deaths
18th-century Austrian scientists
18th-century Latin-language writers
18th-century male writers
Austrian zoologists
Austrian naturalists
Austrian herpetologists
Austrian people of Italian descent
Scientists from Vienna
{{zoologist-stub