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Collecting localities

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Literature

Biographical data

 

Sparrman, Andreas (or Anders)

 

(Source: Flora Malesiana ser. 1, 1: Cyclopaedia of collectors)

(Source: Flora Malesiana ser. 1, 5: Cyclopaedia of collectors, Supplement I)

(Source: Flora Malesiana ser. 1, 8: Cyclopaedia of collectors, Supplement II)

 

Born: 1748, Lena in Uppland, N of Stockholm, Sweden. Died: 1820, Stockholm, Sweden.

 

career:

Med. Dr and natural history investigator, pupil of Linné; he made a voyage to China (see below), to the Cape in 1772 (making excursions partly in company with Thunberg),1 subsequently joined Cook’s 2nd Voyage (see sub Cook) in 1772-75, and returned to the Cape Colony when Cook’s 2nd Voyage touched again at Capetown,4 collecting till 1776.2 When back in Sweden, in 1780, he was appointed Custodian of the Swedish Academy of Science, in 1781 Professor of Natural History at Uppsala, and in 1790 ditto at Stockholm.

He is commemorated in the genus Sparmannia L.f.

 

Collecting localities:

Voyage to China, 1765-67, in the ‘Stockholms Slott’ with Capt. C.G. Ekeberg.3 Sailing from Göteborg (Dec. 28, 1765); via Port St Mariae and Teneriffe to W. Java: anchoring near Ins. Nieuw Bay (= Meeuweneiland) (July 16, 1766); Prints Eyland (= Prinsen-eiland) (July 22); via P. Condor, Macao, proceeding to China; on the voyage home (Jan. 21, 1767 from China) anchoring near Nord Eyland (= prob. Noord-eiland or P. Moendoe, E of the southern extremity of Sumatra) (Febr. 9,1767); via the Cape and the Azores back to Sweden.

 

collections:

Plants from the Cape, New Zealand, etc., in Herb. State Mus. Stockholm [S]. The collection from the China voyage probably in Sweden too. Dupl. in Herb. Acad. Sci. St Petersburg (= Leningrad [LE]) (with coll. Thunberg, pres. 1811); Herb. Linn. Soc. Lond. [LINN] (numerous specimens marked ‘Sp.’).

In Herb. Retzius (= Lund [LD]) many sheets, also from the Pacific (Cook’s 2nd Voyage); with Herb. Alströmer in State Mus. Stockholm [S]; in Herb. Bergius (= Acad. Stockholm [SBT])4; in Herb. Thunberg (= Uppsala [UPS]), several from Cook’s 2nd Voyage, but possibly also from elsewhere.5

 

literature:

(1) cf. Lasègue, Mus. Bot. Deless., 1845, p. 445.

(2) A. Sparrman: ‘A voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, towards the antarctic polar world and round the world; but chiefly into the country of the Hottentots and Caffres from the year 1772 to 1776’ (London 1785, 2 vols, transl. from Swedish; also French transl., Paris 1787, 3 vols).

A. Sparmann: ‘Un compagnon Suédois du Capitaine James Cook. La coquille qui chante’ (Oslo 1939; transl. from Resa till Goda Hopps-Udden ... 1783, 1802).

(3) A. Sparrman: ‘Iter in Chinam’ (Diss. Acad. in Linnaeus, Amoen. Acad. 7, 2nd ed. 1789, p. 497-506; a list of 10 plants from Meeuwen Island on p. 499, of 7 plants from Noord Island on p. 504).

(4) In a MS letter to Bergius, dated Nov. 1771 (in R. Swed. Ac. Sc., Stockholm), C.G. Ekeberg recommended Sparrman on condition that specimens of the latter’s collections would be sent to Bergius. From another letter it is evident that at least in Aug. 1773 a small collection of Cape plants was sent to Bergius.

H. St. John’s statement (Natur. Canad. 98, 1971, p. 563) that Sparmann was asked to join the expedition at the Cape at the instigation of the Forsters seems doubtful with a view to the earlier recommendation by Ekeberg.

(5) In 1779 A. Alnoor (see there) wrote a letter to Thunberg on material collected by Sparrman at the Cape, Batavia (Java), Ceylon, etc. (MS letter in Library Univ. Uppsala).

 

biographical data:

Wikström, Conspect. Litt. Bot. Suet., 1831, p. 239-240 (bibliogr.); Bretschneider, Hist. Bot. Disc. China 1898, p. 61-62; Wittrock, Icon. Bot. Berg., 2, 1905, p. 53; portr. in ‘Naturhistoriska Riksmuseets Historia’ 1916, p. 17; Krok, Bibl. Bot. Suecana, 1925, p. 662; Backer, Verkl. Woordenb., 1936; specimen of handwriting in Sp. Savage, A catalogue of the Linnean Herbarium, London 1945, fig. 11; J. S. Aft. Bot. 23, 1957, p. 43-63 with portr. (pl. 17), 127-137.

Sparrman, A.

ITINERARY.

COLLECTIONS.

LITERATURE.

BIOGRAPHICAL DATA.

 

Sparrman, Andreas (or Anders)

 

LITERATURE. (2) Add:

(4) In Suppl. Cycl. Fl. Mall 1, 5, 1958 add: