Osbeck
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Pehr Osbeck (1723 – 23 December 1805) was a Swedish explorer,
naturalist Natural history is a domain of inquiry involving organisms, including animals, fungi, and plants, in their natural environment, leaning more towards observational than experimental methods of study. A person who studies natural history is cal ...
and an apostle of Carl Linnaeus. He was born in the parish of Hålanda on
Västergötland Västergötland (), also known as West Gothland or the Latinized version Westrogothia in older literature, is one of the 25 traditional non-administrative provinces of Sweden (''landskap'' in Swedish), situated in the southwest of Sweden. Vä ...
and studied at
Uppsala Uppsala ( ; ; archaically spelled ''Upsala'') is the capital of Uppsala County and the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, fourth-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö. It had 177,074 inhabitants in 2019. Loc ...
with
Carolus Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...
.


Naturalist in Canton

In 1750–1752 he travelled as chaplain on the ship ''Prins Carl'' to
Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...
where he spent four months studying the flora, fauna, and people of the Canton region of
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
. He returned home just in time to contribute more than 600 species of plant to Linnaeus' ''Species Plantarum'', published in 1753. In 1757 he published the journal of his voyage to China, ''Dagbok öfwer en ostindisk Resa åren 1750, 1751, 1752'', which was translated into German in 1762 and EnglishGoogle books
/ref> in 1771. In 1758, he was elected a member of the
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences () is one of the Swedish Royal Academies, royal academies of Sweden. Founded on 2 June 1739, it is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization that takes special responsibility for promoting nat ...
.


Later career

He ended his career as the parish priest of Våxtorp and Hasslöv in
Halland Halland () is one of the traditional provinces of Sweden (''landskap''), on the western coast of Götaland, southern Sweden. It borders Västergötland, Småland, Skåne, Scania and the sea of Kattegat. Until 1645 and the Second Treaty of Br ...
, where he died in 1805.


Collections

His large collections are preserved in Sweden and the UK. He is commemorated by the genus ''
Osbeckia ''Osbeckia'' is a genus of plants in the family Melastomataceae. It was named by Carl Linnaeus for the Sweden, Swedish explorer and naturalist Pehr Osbeck (1723–1805). Distribution Osbeckias are native to Eastern Asia — China, Japan, Malay ...
'' L. of plants in the family
Melastomataceae Melastomataceae () is a family of dicotyledonous flowering plants found mostly in the tropics (two-thirds of the genera are from the New World tropics) comprising c. 175 genera and c. 5115 known species. Melastomes are annual or perennial herbs ...
.


Selected works

* * Osbeck, Pehr (1771)
''A voyage to China and East Indies,'' Vol. I.
London: Benjamin White. igitized by University of Hong Kong University of Hong Kong#Libraries and museums">Libraries A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...

Digital Initiatives"China Through Western Eyes."
] * Osbeck, Pehr (1771)
''A voyage to China and East Indies,'' Vol. II.
London: Benjamin White. igitized by University of Hong Kong University of Hong Kong#Libraries and museums">Libraries A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...

Digital Initiatives"China Through Western Eyes."
]


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Osbeck, Pehr 1723 births 1805 deaths People from Ale Municipality Swedish naturalists Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Age of Liberty people Swedish explorers