Carl Linnaeus

Carl Linnaeus was born in 1707 at Råshult, Sweden to Nils Linnaeus, the village curate and amateur botanist, and Christina, daughter of a rector. A teacher recognized Carl’s youthful interest in botany and recommended that he study medicine at the University (botany was an important aspect of medicine at the time). Linnaeus transferred to Uppsala University in 1727. While at University, Linnaeus wrote a paper about the sexuality of plants. In 1730, he began to question the current plant classification system, which was to compile a string of Latin adjectives that described the plant, animal, or mineral. As more discoveries were made worldwide, this method was quickly becoming unwieldy.

In 1732, at the age of 25, Linnaeus was commissioned by the Royal Society of Science to travel throughout Lapland to investigate its flora, fauna, and minerals. He spent five months in the field collecting and observing. He reported his finds in Florula Lapponica, his first publication to use his ‘sexual system’ of classification for plants. From 1733 – 1740 he continued studying botany, lived abroad, obtained his medical degree, set up a medical practice, and married Sara Lisa.

Photo of Linnaeus's bedroom taken at the Hammarby Museum
by Swedish photographer Emma Schenson in 1864. The walls
are papered with copies of botantical drawings by Charles Plumier
(French botanist) and Georg Ehret (botanical artist).
This work is in the public domain in the United States, and those countries
with a copyright term of life of the author plus 90 years or fewer.

In 1741, he accepted a medical professorship at Uppsala University. At University he lectured, wrote, promoted his method of classification, and mentored a new generation of botanist. He sent out his “apostles” to collect and classify specimens from all over the world, and promote his classification system. He continued to publish, teach, summer in Hammarby, and correspond with botanists all over the world until his death in 1778.