Georg Dionysius Ehret

Georg Dionysius Ehret ( born January 30, 1708 Heidelberg, † September 9, 1770 in Chelsea ) was a painter and botanist plants. Its official botanical author abbreviation is "Honour ".

Life and work

Georg Dionysius Ehret was born in 1708 in Heidelberg. He trained as a gardener. His father taught him the plant painting. His mother remarried after the death of his father the overseer of the margrave's gardens in Heidelberg, who entrusted him with the supervision of a part of the gardens. He was responsible for the design of the garden in Karlsruhe. Already at that time he was the Margrave Karl III. Wilhelm of Baden- Durlach through his drawings. There was trouble with the other gardeners, he had to leave Heidelberg and he traveled over Nuremberg, Ulm, Regensburg to Vienna. During this time he tried to live by his plant drawings. Finally he settled in Regensburg and worked for the pharmacist Johann Wilhelm Weinmann, the poorly paid him for his drawings and used them without mentioning the name of Ehret in his Phytanthoza iconographia ( 1737-1745 ).

Soon after, he met the doctor Christoph Jacob Trew of Nuremberg who became his patron and friend. The mid- 1730s he toured the European cities of Basel, Paris, Lausanne, Geneva, Lyon and Montpellier. 1735 he went to England and met in London Hans Sloane and Philip Miller. During this time he worked as a gardener and successfully sold his plants drawings. Many of them went to Trew and later served as illustrations for his works Hortus nitidissimus (1750-1786) and Plantae selectae ( 1750-1773 ).

In Holland, on the estate of George Clifford in Hartekamp, met Ehret 1736 for the first time with Carl Linnaeus together. Linnaeus worked there just in his work Hortus Cliffortianus ( 1738), was responsible for the Ehret including a plaque for his classification of plants based on the stamens. This collaboration with Linnaeus lasted until his death. On his return to London he married in 1738 Susanna Kennet, the sister in law Philip Miller, with whom he had the son of George Philip. Miller was since 1721 Head of the Chelsea Physic Garden, where Ehret frequently recorded. On 19 May 1757 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Georg Dionysius Ehret died in 1770 in his adopted home of England. He left behind more than 3000 drawings. His works can be found for example in the Natural History Museum in London, the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, the Royal Society in London, the Lindley Library of the Royal Horticultural Society, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the University Library in Erlangen.

Ehrentaxon

Christoph Jacob Trew named in his honor the genus Ehretia.

Writings (selection )

Works with drawings by him

The Gardener 's Dictionary (1731-1771) by Philip Miller ( without illustrations )
Phytanthoza iconographia (1737-1745) by Johann Wilhelm Weinmann
Hortus Cliffortianus of Carl Linnaeus
Plantae et papiliones rariores (1748-1759) by Georg Dionysus Ehret
Hortus nitidissimis (1750-1786) by Christoph Jacob Trew
Plantae selectae (1750-1773) by Christoph Jacob Trew
The civil and natural history of Jamaica (1756 ) by Patrick Browne
Hortus Kewensis (1789 ) by William Aiton

Journal articles

De Arboribus Sassafras dictis & Londinis cultis, earumque floris charactere. In: '' Nova Acta Physico - Medica Academiae Caesareae Leopoldino - Carolinae Naturae Curiosorum. Volume 2, 1761, pp. 326-330, Table 6 (online)
De Planta Lithospermo affini. In: Nova Acta Physico - Medica Academiae Caesareae Leopoldino - Carolinae Naturae Curiosorum. Volume 2, 1761, pp. 330-332 (online).
An Account of a Species of Ophris, Supposed to be the Plant, Which is Mentioned by Gronovius in the Flora virginica, p. 185, under the name of Ophris Scapo Nudo Foliis Radicalibus ovato - Oblongis, Dimidii SCAPI Longitudine. In: Philosophical Transactions. Volume 53, 1763, pp. 81-83 ( DOI: 10.1098/rstl.1763.0021 ).
An Account of a New Peruvian Plant, Lately Introduced into the English Gardens; Several Characters of the Which Differ from All the genera Hitherto Described. In: Philosophical Transactions. Volume 53, 1763, pp. 130-132 ( DOI: 10.1098/rstl.1763.0027 ).
A Description of the Andrachne, with Its Botanical Characters. In: Philosophical Transactions. Volume 57, 1767, pp. 114-117 ( DOI: 10.1098/rstl.1767.0015 ).

Evidence

Wilfrid Blunt: The Art of Botanical Illustration: An Illustrated History. Dover Publications, 1994, ISBN 0-486-27265-6.
Gerta Calmann: Ehret: Flower painter extraordinary: an illustrated biography. Phaidon, 1977, ISBN 0-7148-1776-7.
E. G. Ehret: A Memoir of Georg Dionysius Ehret. In: Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London. 1894-1895, pp. 41-58.
Gordon Douglas Rowley: A History of Succulent Plants. Strawberry Press, 1997, ISBN 0-912647-16-0 ( ISBN formally wrong ).
Gill Saunders: Ehret 's flowering plants. H. N. Abrams, New York, 1988, ISBN 0-8109-0887-5.

Comments

Chelsea (London) Charles III William, Margrave of Baden-Durlach Wilfrid Jasper Walter Blunt Digital Object Identifier Neue Deutsche Biographie International Plant Names Index Integrated Authority File

369089