Everything about Ulissi Aldrovandi totally explained
Ulisse Aldrovandi (
11 September 1522 -
4 May 1605) was an
Italian naturalist, the moving force behind
Bologna's
botanical garden, one of the first in
Europe.
Carolus Linnaeus and the
comte de Buffon reckoned him the father of
natural history studies. He is usually referred to, especially in older literature, as
Aldrovandus.
Early life and education
Aldrovandi was born in
Bologna to a noble family, which sent him to apprentice with merchants, but he found his vocation, after studying
humanities and
law at the universities of Bologna and
Padua and becoming a
notary. Successively his interests went out to
philosophy and
logic which he combined with the study of medicine.
He obtained a degree in medicine and
philosophy in
1553 and started teaching
logic and philosophy in
1554 at the University of Bologna. In
1559 he became professor of philosophy and in
1561 he became the first professor of
natural sciences at Bologna (
lectura philosophiae naturalis ordinaria de fossilibus, plantis et animalibus).
Arrest for heresy
In June of 1549 he was accused and arrested for heresy, for espousing the anti-trinitarian beliefs of the
Anabaptist Camillo Renato. By September he'd published an abjuration, but was transferred to Rome, and remained in custody or house arrest till absolved in April 1550. During this time he befriended many local scholars. While in semi-captivity there he became more and more interested in
botanics,
zoology and
geology (apparently he can be credited for the invention/first written record of this word). From 1551 onward, he organized a variety of expeditions to the Italian mountains, countryside, islands, and coasts in order to collect and catalogue plants.
Natural history work
In the course of his life he'd assemble one of the most spectacular cabinets of curiosities, his "theatre" illuminating
natural history comprising some 7000 specimens of the
diversità di cose naturali, of which he wrote a description in
1595. Between
1551 and
1554 he organised several expeditions to collect plants for a
herbarium, among the first botanizing expeditions. Eventually his herbarium contained aboiut 4760 dried specimens on 4117 sheets in sixteen volumes, preserved at the University of Bologna. He also had various artists, including
Jacopo Ligozzi,
Giovanni Neri, and
Cornelio Schwindt, make illustrations of specimens.
Botanic garden
At his demand and under his direction a public
botanic garden was created in Bologna in
1568, now the
Orto Botanico dell'Università di Bologna. Due to a dispute on the composition of a popular medicine with the pharmacists and doctors of Bologna in
1575 he was suspended from all public position for five years. In
1577 he sought the aid of
pope Gregory XIII (a cousin of his mother) who wrote to the authorities of Bologna to reinstate Aldrovandi in his public offices and request financial aid to help him publish his books.
Collections
His vast collections in botany and zoology he willed to the Senate of Bologna; until
1742 the collections were conserved in the Palazzo Pubblico, then in the Palazzo Poggi, but were distributed among various libraries and institutions in the course of the nineteenth century. In 1907 a representative part were reunited at Palazzo Poggi, Bologna, where the 400th anniversary of his death was memorialized in a celebrative exhibition in 2005.
List of works
Of the several hundred books and essays he wrote, only a handful were published during his lifetime:
Honors
The wrinkle-ridge Dorsa Aldrovandi on the Moon is named after him.
The Civico Orto Botanico "Ulisse Aldrovandi" in San Giovanni in Persiceto is named in his honor.Further Information
Get more info on 'Ulissi Aldrovandi'.
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