Johan Peter Rottler (June 174924 January 1836) was a French

missionary A missionary is a member of a Religious denomination, religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Tho ...

and botanist, most associated with the Danish Mission in

Tranquebar Tharangambadi (), formerly Tranquebar ( da, Trankebar, ), is a town in the Mayiladuthurai district of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu on the Coromandel Coast. It lies north of Karaikal, near the mouth of a distributary named Uppanar of the ...

and later

Vepery Vepery is a suburb in the north of Chennai, India. Abutting the transportation hub of Park Town, the neighbourhood covers a rectangular area north of the Poonamallee High Road. History Vepery is among those oldest neighbourhoods developed duri ...

, Chennai in southern India. He was born in Strasbourg, France in 1749, and studied at the local Gymnasium from the age of nine. He was influenced by the master of the school Dr Lorenz . In 1766 he joined the University of Strasbourg and studied for nine years. He was

ordained Ordination is the process by which individuals are consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the denominational hierarchy composed of other clergy) to perform var ...

, and went as a missionary to southern India in 1776 at the recommendation of Dr Freylinghausen of Halle. His first appointment along with Johann Wilhelm Gerlach was at the Danish

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Cathol ...

Tranquebar Mission The Tranquebar Mission ( da, Trankebarmissionen; ta, தரங்கம்பாடி பணி) was established in 1706 by two German missionaries from Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg, Halle namely, Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg and H ...

; in 1806, he moved to an English mission in

Madras Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Tamil Nadu, the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost states and territories of India, Indian state. The largest city ...

, where he died in 1836. Continuing the work of earlier naturalists in the region including Johann Gerhard König, Rottler became an enthusiastic botanist, who collected more than 2000 plant samples from southern India and sent them to Europe for study and research. Rottler also studied the Tamil language and compiled a dictionary. He married a Dutch lady, a widow of a Dutch ship captain, in 1779 and who died in Vepery in 1827 from cancer. He corresponded with Dr Schreber at the University of Erlangen and received a Doctor in Philosophy in 1795. In 1795 he accompanied Sir Hugh Cleghorn, secretary to

Lord North Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford (13 April 17325 August 1792), better known by his courtesy title Lord North, which he used from 1752 to 1790, was 12th Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1770 to 1782. He led Great Britain through most ...

. Cleghorn made use of Rottler's knowledge of botany and natural history. A trunk full of plant specimens was sent to the Great Herbarium of King's College London. In 1873, this collection was transferred to the

Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew is a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. An internationally important botanical research and education institution, it employs 1,10 ...

, London. In 1803, Rottler was put in charge of the Vepery mission to replace Paezold who had moved to teach Tamil at the Fort William College. His findings were published in Europe in 1803, but went largely overlooked for many years. Most of Rottler's botanical collections are in the Royal Herbarium of Munich. Many of his plants were described by

Carl Ludwig Willdenow Carl Ludwig Willdenow (22 August 1765 – 10 July 1812) was a German botanist, pharmacist, and plant taxonomist. He is considered one of the founders of phytogeography, the study of the geographic distribution of plants. Willdenow was a ...

Martin Vahl Martin Henrichsen Vahl (10 October 1749 – 24 December 1804) was a Danish-Norwegian botanist, herbalist and zoologist. Biography Martin Vahl was born in Bergen, Norway and attended Bergen Cathedral School. He studied botany at the Univers ...

and others. The genus ''Rottlera'' was named after him by Vahl but is now a synonym of ''Mallotus''. A memorial tablet to Rottler is in the Vepery church.

References

External links

Travel diary of Rottler and J.G. Klein, October 1792
1749 births 1836 deaths Scientists from Strasbourg 19th-century French botanists French Lutheran missionaries Lutheran missionaries in India French expatriates in India Missionary botanists 18th-century French botanists {{France-botanist-stub