Frank Wall
Frank Wall (* April 21, 1868 in Nuwara Eliya, Ceylon, † May 19 1950 in Bournemouth, Dorset) was a British military physician and herpetologist. His research focus were the snakes and blind snakes of the Near East and British India.
Life and work
Through his father, who was a prominent politician in Ceylon, Wall to interested early on natural history. In 1892 he qualified at the Middlesex Hospital in London for a Membership ( MRCP ) and as a licentiate ( LRCP ) at the Royal College of Physicians. In 1893, he joined the Indian Medical Service, and after completing his training in Netley Hospital in Southampton, he traveled to India.
Until his retirement from the army and his return to England he was several times in India, stationed in Ceylon and Burma, where he collected snakes in his spare time. During the First World War, he served at the front Mesopotamia and France. For this he was awarded the Order of St Michael and St George. In 1920 he was promoted to Colonel.
Back in England, Wall transferred his holotypes and his skull collection to the Natural History Museum. Since Wallfeld researchers and scientists was not a museum, he gave up his herpetological research. He was interested in the study of living snakes ( Ophiologie ), in particular the systematics, distribution, lifestyle and anatomy.
In the period 1898-1925 published Wall about 215 scientific articles, including the first descriptions to Amphiesma bitaeniatum, Amphiesma venningi, Amphiesma xenura, Boiga andamanensis, Boiga beddomei, Boiga quincunciata, Brachyophidium rhodogaster, Bungarus magnimaculatus, Bungarus niger, Dendrelaphis cyanochloris, Dendrelaphis Gorei, Eirenis mcmahoni, Lycodon flavomaculatus, Lycodon mackinnoni, Naja sagittifera, Oligodon erythrorhachis, Oligodon juglandifer, Oligodon mcdougalli, Oligodon melaneus, Oligodon melanozonatus, Rhabdophis leonardi, Rhinophis drummondhayi, Rhinophis porrectus, Telescopus tessellatus, Thermophis baileyi, Typhlops Fletcheri, Typhlops oligolepis and Typhlops wilsoni.
Walls first major work was a continuation of publication in the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society. The contribution of A Popular Treatise on the Common Indian Snakes contains 28 color plates and appeared 1905-1919 in 29 parts. 1907, the first edition of the work The Poisonous Terrestrial Snakes of our British Indian Dominions has been published. 1908, 1913 and 1928 were moved by this book three more runs. 1921 Wall wrote his most famous book entitled Ophidia Taprobanica or the Snakes of Ceylon. Between 1923 and 1925, the five -part work A Hand List of Snakes of the Indian Empire, a systematic list of all the synonyms appeared are listed.