Francis Willughby
Francis Willughby [' wɪləbi ˑ ] (also Francis Willoughby, born November 22, 1635 Middleton Hall, Warwickshire, England; † July 3, 1672 in Wollaton Hall ) was an English naturalist, ornithologist and ichthyologist especially.
Life and work
Francis Willughby studied at Cambridge (1653-1659) and became a disciple of John Ray, with whom he went in 1662 to the west coast of Wales, to observe the nesting seabirds. On May 20 In 1663 he became a member ( "Original Fellow" ) of the Royal Society. 1667 married Francis Willughby Emma Barnard, with whom he had three children. Son Francis died at 19, daughter Cassandra ( 1670-1735 ) was Duchess Chandos, and son Thomas ( 1672-1730 ) was from Queen Anne to peer applicable ( 1st Baron Middleton ).
1663-1666 Willughby had traveled the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Italy with Ray and Willughby alone nor Spain. Returned they planned now a publication of their research, but Willughby, of a weak constitution, soon died of pleurisy. Ray published Willughbys Ornithologiae libri III 1676 (English: 1678). , The beginning of scientific ornithology - for example, it was shown that the swallows contrary to Aristotle's opinion of migratory birds were - in 1686 followed Willughbys De historia piscium libri IV and 1710 his History of Insects (edited by William Derham ).
Francis Willughby was the first - explicitly banished considerations of its natural history ( biological ) texts as unscientific all peaceful, moral and psychic (about alchemical ) - as opposed to Konrad Gesner yet. In an attempt to get closer in the arrangement of species and genera of the natural relationship Willughby and Ray have taken a huge step forward -. Willughby incidentally also wrote a book about the games of its time, from the standpoint of the mathematician, which was re- edited in 2003.
At the family home of the Willughbys, Wollaton Hall ( now owned by the city of Nottingham ), the collections Willughbys and Rays available (principally Stopfpräparate of birds and mammals, there had been also a large herbarium brought back from the trip to Europe ). Willughbys manuscripts are in the Middleton collection at the library of the University of Nottingham.
After Willughby are named: a leaf-cutter bee ( Megachile willughbiella Kirby 1802) and the Apocynaceae genus Willughbeia.
Writings (selection )
- Ornithologiae libri tres. (online).
- De historia libri quatuor piscium. (online).