Raddi’s visit to Brazil in a historical context

ABSTRACT

In order to appreciate better the relevance of Giuseppe Raddi’s contribution to the knowledge of Brazil’s flora and fauna, as well as to the development of Botany, considerations on the social and political prevailing scenario are presented. Brazil was kept by the Portuguese crown as a closed colony until 1808, and so few major expeditions had visited this mega-diverse county. An entourage of naturalists on the occasion of the wedding of the Archduchess Maria Leopoldina of the Habsburgs and the Portuguese Prince Pedro de Alcântara de Orleans e Bragança, in 1817, provided a major input for the development of natural sciences in Brazil. This brought to Brazil Giuseppe Raddi, Martius, Spix, Mikan and Pohl, who spent varying periods of time studying the diversity of the Brazilian flora and fauna. Raddi, for lack of major funding, could only stay for an eight-month period. He was extremely active and upon his return started to publish his results in 1819. His publications, as discussed in this paper, are very important and his collections are still extremely relevant to the knowledge of the Brazilian flora and fauna, as demonstrated in several recent publications.

KEYWORDS:

• Floristics
• Neotropical botany
• history of science
• taxonomy