Frans Florschütz as founding father of pollen analysis in the Netherlands, and expansion of palynology into the tropics

Abstract

Frans Florschütz (1887‒1965) developed pollen analysis in the Netherlands as a biostratigraphical tool on the interface between geology, palaeobotany, soil science and climate history. He was involved in agricultural practice and the building of large infrastructure. Florschütz established centres of pollen analysis at the universities in Wageningen (1924) and Utrecht (1928), was appointed professor in Leiden (1948) and after retirement founded a chair in pollen analysis in Nijmegen (1960). The botanical institute in Utrecht was Florschütz’ alma mater where he supervised students over two decades. Since 1947 Florschütz trained micropalaeontologists how to use fossil pollen as a biostratigraphical tool in oil industry. He inspired Jonker in Utrecht and Zagwijn in Leiden. Several of his students focused on tropical areas and used applied and academic pollen analysis to explore tropical ecosystems, such as Polak (1930s) and Muller (1950s) in southeast Asia, Van Zinderen Bakker (1950s) in southern Africa, Van der Hammen (1950s) in northern South America, Van Zeist and Bottema (1960s) in the Middle East. He stimulated Shell to be a pioneer in using pollen-based stratigraphy in oil exploration in the tropics. In the late 1940s and 1950s biostratigraphers Germeraad, Hopping, Kuyl, Muller and Waterbolk studied samples from the Caribbean, Nigeria and British Borneo in Shell’s Pollen Laboratories in Maracaibo (Venezuela) and in The Hague. In 1944 ‘pollen analysis’ was renamed ‘palynology’ for good reasons. Laboratory practice in applied research developed differently from academic palynology leading to a hybrid research field. Implications are briefly discussed.

Keywords:

• biostratigraphy
• founding father
• marine micropalaeontology
• marine palynology
• oil exploration
• palaeoecology
• palaeoceanography
• pollen analysis
• Quaternary palynology
• tropical pollen floras

In pollen analysis, fossil pollen (from gymnosperms and angiosperms) and spores (of ferns, fern-allies and fungi) are identified and counted in series of samples along a stratigraphical ideally undisturbed profile. The series of pollen spectra allows the analyst to infer changes in vegetation, environmental setting and climate conditions to be inferred over timescales from decennia to millions of years. The historical development of pollen analysis received attention from early days (e.g. Woodehouse 1935; Erdtman 1943; Faegri & Iversen 1950, 1964, 1975, 1989; West 1971), but also more recently (Birks & Berglund 2016; Edwards & Pardoe 2018). On a global scale Lennart von Post is recognised as the founding father of pollen analysis (Von Post 1909). In his seminal lecture at the ‘Scandinavian Naturalists’ in Oslo in 1916, he presented the first pollen data in the form of a pollen diagram (Von Post 1918; Birks & Berglund 2016). Pollen analysis then developed into a widely used applied methodology to establish relative chronology in sediment sequences and to relate multiple cores laterally with each other. Pollen analysis is also an important method used to reconstruct changes in vegetation cover, climate change, and the development of human impact on the environment. Over long timescales, pollen analysis may reveal the evolution of ecosystems over geological timescales, e.g. driven by mountain uplift, continental drift and changing ocean currents. Pollen analysis has been widely applied in oil exploration (mainly pre-Quaternary sediments), and in academic research (climate change, palaeobiogeography), archaeology, commerce (melissopalynology), health care (hay fever warning systems), crime detection (forensic palynology) (Coyle 2005), today also in windfarm development (mainly Quaternary sediments).

Pollen analysis is a labour-intensive method, as fossil pollen and spores are viewed and identified by the specialist analyst. Attempts to speed up pollen identification by automated pollen recognition or chemical identification have been found not to be wholly successful (France et al. 2000; Marcos et al. 2015, and references cited therein). The accuracy of pollen identification therefore depends upon the experience of the individual analyst and the available support, usually in the form of pollen reference collections and pollen atlases to support accurate pollen identifications and data interpretation. Although pollen analysis developed much with respect to data analysis, data presentation, interpretation and applications, the quality of results also depends on the technical skills inherent in core sampling in the field and laboratory preparation. A familiarity with the ecosystems of study areas is of crucial importance as pollen analysis has intensive links with botany, ecology, soils and climate. Pollen grains and fern spores are also found as allochthonous components in marine sediments where foraminifera, ostracoda, radiolaria, marine diatoms, calcareous nannofossils, dinoflagellate cysts and acritarchs, all of marine origin, occur frequently.

The objectives of this article are (1) to elucidate the role of Frans Florschütz in the development of pollen analysis in the Netherlands, (2) to show the contribution of Dutch pollen researchers in the earliest development of pollen-based palaeoecology and palaeobiostratigraphy in the tropics, and (3) to address the implications of renaming ‘pollen analysis’ to ‘palynology’, a term which in practice became an umbrella-term for the study of the full range of terrestrial and marine microfossils.

Florschütz life, work and development of pollen analysis in the Netherlands

Frans Florschütz was born on 13 June 1887 in Hasselt, a small town in the province of Overijssel. His father was a teacher. His parents moved to The Hague where Frans received his elementary and secondary education; he attended the ‘Hoogere Burger School’ (HBS) from 1900 to 1905. He studied political economy and obtained a certification to teach at secondary schools in 1908. He became a teacher of political economy at a Commercial School in The Hague, at a HBS in Voorschoten (Figure 1). At that time an education at the HBS gave no entrance to the university. In 1911 Florschütz passed the ‘Staatsexamen’ allowing him to start a study in Law at the University of Leiden. He passed his master exam (’kandidaatsexamen’) in 1913. From 1914 there is evidence he was a member of the Netherlands Natural History Society (Nederlandse Natuurhistorische Vereniging [NNV]). He passed his doctoral exam in Law on 29 March 1916, defended his propositions successfully on 5 July 1916 and he received the title ‘Master in Law’ (‘Meester in de Rechten’ [Mr]). In this year he married Cornelia Hendrika Gits, a primary school teacher. They had no children. In 1916 Florschütz started teaching political economy at the School for Advanced Commerce in Deventer. In 1916 he also got a position at the ‘Ministry of Agriculture, Industry and Commerce’ in The Hague and he became promoted twice in a short time. Secretary General Van Hoek of this Ministry had noticed Florschütz’ capacities for higher-ranked positions. In the same year of 1916 he was appointed by Royal Decision (‘Koninklijk Besluit’) in the function of clerk (‘Commies’). He was also teaching political economy at an evening school in The Hague. Shortly after 1918, he started a study in biology at the University of Utrecht. Perhaps he was inspired by Lennart von Post who gave his lecture in Oslo in 1916, generally accepted as the start of pollen analysis (Birks & Berglund 2016).

Figure 1. Chronogramme of Frans Florschütz’ education as a jurist and scientific career in geobiology. Green: number of publications (annually varying from one to seven); black dots: career specific events; red asterisks: publications and lecture with significant impact on the development of his scientific work.

In 1918 he was released from his position as clerk related to the establishment of the Landbouwhogeschool (today ‘Wageningen University and Research Centre’). He was appointed secretary of the Board of Governors (‘College van Curatoren’). He would continue this position up to 1946. He was two days a week in Wageningen and longer if necessary. In 1919 the young family moved to a newly build neighbourhood in Velp, near Arnhem. In 1920 and 1922 Florschütz gave talks and dealt with collections of the Netherlands Mycological Society. In 1923 he passed his bachelor exam (‘kandidaatsexamen’) in biology. Fascinated by the potentials of palaeobotany in 1924 he founded a private laboratory in the garden of his house. He started with studying macrofossils and soon acquired the laboratory equipment to chemically prepare pollen samples. His private pollen laboratory, mostly addressed as Palaeobotanical Laboratory, became part of the Landbouwhogeschool.

Florschütz’ position as a jurist in the Board of Govenors in Wageningen, his part-time study in biology at Utrecht University and his teaching activities at the higher education level in The Hague and Deventer allowed him to develop a remarkable career in the field of research where palaeobotany, soil science, climate history and geology are meeting. His personal archive is very rich in correspondence, counting sheets, pollen diagrams, interpretations written as unpublished reports, and occasionally regional overviews. Pollen analysis at the Botanical Museum and Herbarium of the State University of Utrecht (later, Laboratory of Systematic Botany) possibly started shortly after 1925. A pollen record of the Soesterveen was analysed by student G. Vermeulen. In 1929 Florschütz supervised Maurits Henri van Raalte, Evert Christiaan Wassink, and Willem Hilbrand van Dobben; all these students reached a position of professor at the universities in Groningen and Wageningen. On 17 March 1930 Florschütz obtained his master degree in biology at Utrecht University. After his graduation he continued to serve his alma mater and continued travelling to Utrecht one day a week and enthusiastically taught numerous students pollen analysis up to 1947 (Jonker 1967).

In 1947 Florschütz received from Utrecht University the degree of ‘doctor honoris causa’, and left the Botanical Museum and Herbarium to continue his activities at the Geological Institute of Leiden University. During the curriculum year 1947‒1948 he became an unsalaried university lecturer (‘privaat docent’) in pollen analysis. On 16 December 1948 he obtained the position of professor by special appointment (‘Bijzonder Hoogleraar’) in ‘Palaeophytology of the Cainozoicum and Palynology’ at Leiden University, also a part-time position.

His palaeobotanical laboratory in Velp was the centre of his investigations for 40 years. For the operational costs and salaries of several part-time pollen analysts he received grants from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fishery and Food supply on an annual basis. The Dutch Science Foundation ZWO provided him grants for travelling, fieldwork and radiocarbon dating. Lithological description, sample preparation, pollen analysis and presenting the data in a pollen diagram were carried out by his analysts and Florschütz prepared the interpretation of the results. A year after he founded his private pollen laboratory Florschütz published his first article on the Pleistocene flora of the Netherlands (Florschütz 1925). In the decade after he completed his studies in botany and geology, i.e. the period from 1930 to 1942, he published frequently in international journals (Figure 1). Florschütz became a pivotal person at national and international level in his broad field of research. In addition to his two-days-a-week position in Wageningen he became faced with high workloads. He travelled much abroad and had personal contacts with many colleagues in the international research field. He was a frequently asked speaker at congresses. Altogether, this explains why he published mainly short articles. Over the years he prepared dozens of unpublished reports about cores and profiles from sites all over the Netherlands.

His knowledge of the vegetation development since the Late glacial was his yardstick for a biostratigraphical assessment of the age of the sediments. It is a pleasure to read these reports and to observe his skills in distinguishing between reliable parts of interpretations and his speculations. Issues of his special interest were the Late glacial flora and fauna in the Netherlands, the Holocene history of peat and forest development, the nature of peat bogs, archaeology and palaeobotany. He studied many soil profiles in the just reclaimed Noordoostpolder (Supplementary Material). Florschütz also advertised the use of pollen analysis to reconstruct vegetation and climate in public lectures and articles in newspapers. Early outreach for the general public was ‘A thousand millennia of history below Rotterdam’ (‘Duizend eeuwen geschiedenis van de bodem van Rotterdam’) (Florschütz & Van der Vlerk 1939) and a page-size article in the Nieuwe Rotterdamse Courant (Stuvel 1955). In 1950 Van der Vlerk and Florschütz published the fascinating book ‘Nederland in het IJstijdvak’ (The Netherlands during the Ice-ages) (Florschütz & Van de Vlerk, 1950). Florschütz’ personal archive shows that the preparations of this book had already started in 1939. In Western Europe more publications with regional overviews became available in the 1950s, such as ‘The Late-Glacial floras of Denmark and its relation to climate and soil’ (Iversen 1954) and ‘The history of the British flora’ (Godwin 1956).

Florschütz was an easily accessible, enthusiastic, energetic man with significant acuteness and perseverance. He had good skills to address and motivate students. Appointed in Leiden, Florschütz started training courses for biostratigraphers in the oil industry. He trained a next generation of pollen analysts and several of them found jobs in academic and applied research. Several of his PhD students reached key positions at universities. In Utrecht the professors Pulle, Rutten and Koningsberger gave him much support in research activities and supervising students. Frits Jonker (1917‒1990) was his most notable student at the University of Utrecht, followed by Thomas van der Hammen (1924‒2010) (Figure 2) and Waldo Zagwijn (1928‒2018) during his professorship in Leiden. Jonker became professor in Utrecht, Van der Hammen at the University of Amsterdam and Zagwijn had a career at the Geological Survey and ended up as professor at Free University Amsterdam. Daan Teunissen (1925‒2003) succeeded Florschütz at the University of Nijmegen. Waldo Zagwijn’s legacy exists in the form of a published dataset of Pleistocene pollen studies from around the Netherlands (e.g. Zagwijn 1961, 1974; Hooghiemstra & Hoek 2019) which is finding a new lease of life for ongoing studies in relation to windfarm developments and archaeological studies in the Dutch North Sea (e.g. Athersuch et al. 2021a, 2021b).

Figure 2. Right: photograph of Frans Florschütz (1887‒1965); left: his student Thomas van der Hammen (1924‒2010) who succeeded Florschütz as the head of the Palaeobotany Department after his retirement. Source: personal archive T. van der Hammen.

Other pollen analysts with an early career in pollen-based biostratigraphy in the tropics had received a training in soil science or archaeology, including biologist Betje Polak (1901‒1980), agricultural botanist Jan Muller (1921‒1983), micropalaeontologist Johan Germeraad (1920‒2001), O.S. Kuyl (1917‒unknown), and archaeologists Willem van Zeist (1924‒2016) and Sytze Bottema (1937‒2005). Florschütz’ teaching resulted in the ground breaking article ‘The application of palynology to oil geology with reference to western Venezuela’ (Kuyl et al. 1955). This study showed how pollen and spores allowed lateral correlations of sediment sequences enabling the reconstruction of hydrocarbon (oil and gas) reservoirs. From the 1960s onwards pollen-based investigations in combination with systematic data exploration with flash cards, and later with computer applications, were now established as an important biostratigraphical method in oil exploration. Florschütz continued his classes and training courses at the University of Leiden up to his retirement on 31 December 1958, when he was 71. Thomas van der Hammen succeeded him as the head of the Department of Palaeobotany of the Geological Institute.

The new phase in his life after retirement allowed Florschütz to engage in new activities. He was asked to join the editorial board of the French journal ‘Pollen et Spores’. He intensified his work with Josephina Menéndez Amor in Spain. To drill the deep core in the basin of Padul, near Grenada, Florschütz received a substantial grant from the Netherlands Foundation for Pure Scientific Research (ZWO, later NWO). He received also support for radiocarbon dating.

Florschütz sent a proposal to the Board of the Catholic Radboud University in Nijmegen to found a centre for pollen analysis there. This proposal was accepted and Florschütz became professor by special appointment (Buitengewoon Hoogleraar). This appointment was extended on a yearly basis up to Florschütz’ death on 21 July 1965. Less than a year before his death he received the ‘van Waterschoot van der Gracht Award’ issued by the Royal Netherlands Geology and Mining Society (KNGMG) for his pioneering contributions to Dutch earth sciences (De Graaf 1965; Van der Hammen 1965).

Early pollen analysis in the tropics

Here we focus on how pollen-based investigations started up in the tropics, a development in which Dutch researchers had a remarkably high share (Figure 3) and Frans Florschütz an instigating role. In 1939 the Bataafse Petroleum Maatschappij (BPM; later ‘Royal Dutch Shell’) contracted Florschütz to study pollen samples from Colombia, Venezuela and Borneo. It was an opportunity to become familiar with the rich tropical pollen floras. Florschütz realised the potential for biostratigraphical applications and this new understanding led to the decision in 1947 of BPM to establish a palynological laboratory in the oil-rich area of Maracaibo, Venezuela (Van Veen et al. 2012). This initiative by Shell was truly pioneering. Pollen analysts/palynologists at Maracaibo included C.A. Hopping (1923‒unknown), who was British, and the lead author of ‘Palynology and the oil industry’ (Hopping 1967). This article provoked an expansion of biostratigraphical service companies in the 1970s. The Maracaibo team of pollen analysts was, however, mainly Dutch, including J.H. Germeraad (1920‒2001), Jan Muller (1921‒1983) and O.S. Kuyl (1917‒unknown) who all had received training in geology at Utrecht University where Frans Florschütz had taught over two decades up to 1948. With Frans Florschütz the Utrecht laboratory had grown into an international centre for palaeobiostratigraphy and research was later continued by Frits Jonker and Henk Visscher. Frits Jonker was familiar with pollen analysis in Surinam but it did not become a major part of his curriculum.

Figure 3. Map showing the study areas of B. Polak (1901‒1980), F. Jonker (1917‒1990), E.M. Van Zinderen Bakker (1907‒2002), J. Muller (1921‒1983), T. Van der Hammen (1924‒2010), W. Van Zeist (1924‒2016) and S. Bottema (1937‒2005) plotted on a map showing the Palaeotropical and Neotropical realms. The areas of interest for oil exploration (dotted areas) were explored by J. Muller (1921‒1983), C.A. Hopping (1923‒unknown), J.H. Germeraad (1920‒2001), O.S. Kuyl (1917‒unknown) and H.T. Waterbolk (1924‒2020).

Florschütz did not publish about the tropics. However, he was suitably honoured by the creation of the fossil pollen genus Florschuetzia (Figure 4), published after his death by Germeraad et al. in 1968. The genus is linked primarily to the modern mangrove taxon Sonneratia (e.g. S. alba and S. caseolaris) which occurs mainly in tropical Asia and East Africa (Mao & Foong 2013). Florschuetzia remains, to this day, the most useful single fossil pollen lineage in southeast Asia (Morley 2000) and is used very extensively in biostratigraphic studies (e.g. Morley et al. 2021).

Figure 4. Photomicrographs of Sonneratia pollen, living relatives of the ancestral pollen lineage Florschuetzia, named in memory of Frans Florschütz, the founder of palynology in the Netherlands (Germeraad et al. 1968). Sonneratia is a mangrove tree found throughout south-eastern Asia and locally in eastern Africa (Mao & Foong 2013). A, B. Pollen of Sonneratia caseolaris, the modern descendent of Florschuetzia levipoli Germeraad, showing smooth ‘caps’ in the polar areas of the pollen grains; (A) S. caseolaris LM; (B) S. caseolaris SEM. C, D. Pollen of Sonneratia alba, the modern descendent of Florschuetzia meridionalis Germeraad. Florschuetzia meridionalis is distinguished by distinct columellae in the polar regions and by meridional ridges across the long axis of the pollen grains; (C) S. alba LM; (D) S. alba SEM. All specimens obtained from Hainan Island, southern China, collected and photographed by Dr Limi Mao, Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences. LM, light microscopy; SEM, scanning electron microscopy. The pollen specimens were acetolysed before LM imaging with an Olympus BX 51 microscope and DP70 CCD camera and SEM imaging using a HITACHI S-4800. Published with the kind permission of Limi Mao.

In the following section we give a sketch of the few pollen analysts who around 1950 initiated research in the tropics, including applied research at oil companies and geological surveys (Van der Hammen, Waterbolk, Germeraad, Muller) as well as academic research at universities (Polak, Van Zinderen Bakker, Van Zeist, Bottema) (Figure 5).

Figure 5. Dutch palynologists with their period of publications (the 1920‒1970 interval is shown). Black line: all publications; green intervals: publications on tropical studies. The main educational background is shown.

Betje Polak (1901‒1980; publications mainly between 1929‒1968) graduated in biology in 1926 from Amsterdam University. Her subsequent PhD study focus was the origin of peat deposits below sea level in the western Netherlands and entitled ‘Een onderzoek naar de botanische samenstelling van het Hollandsche veen’ (‘An investigation into the botanical composition of the Holland Veen’) (Polak 1929). She showed that the stratigraphical succession of the ‘low-lying peat’ (often now referred to as the ‘basal peat’ of earliest Holocene age) progressed from ‘eutrophic fen peat’ via ‘forest peat’ to older and younger Sphagnum peat, identical to the succession in the raised bogs on the higher Pleistocene cover sands in the Netherlands. The poor economic position of the Netherlands in the 1930s drove her to the Dutch East Indies to continue peat studies in Java, Borneo and Sumatra (Polak 1933) from which she returned in 1932 (Havinga & Muller 1981). In 1939 she went to Java again and continued peat studies in relation to agriculture (Polak 1941), but she was interned during the Japanese occupation (1942‒1945). Polak recuperated in the United States and returned, via the Netherlands, to Indonesia where she obtained a permanent position. In 1952 she was appointed professor of botany and genetics at the Medical Faculty of the University of Jakarta. In 1954 she revisited the Netherlands on leave but was unable to go back to Jakarta because of the increasing political instability. Soil scientist professor Edelman offered her a position in Wageningen. She started her job with a training period in the laboratory of John Iversen in Denmark. Polak’s strongest interests were in the development of vegetation and agriculture since Neolithic times. Betje Polak laid the foundation of research on peat and its significance for understanding past environments in southeast Asia as exemplified especially by her articles which appeared between 1933 and 1952.

Eduard M. van Zinderen Bakker (1907‒2002; main period of publications 1942‒1995) was a landscape ecologist fascinated by the interactions of landscape and climate over Quaternary timescales. He is well known for his studies of the Naardermeer nature reserve (Van Zinderen Bakker 1942) and the study of wetland lakes in the western Netherlands (Van Zinderen Bakker 1947). He and his wife left the Netherlands in 1946 to start a new career in South Africa. He obtained a position at the University of Bloemfontein. He stimulated research in Africa by starting the book series ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ which reached its 35th volume in 2021. Many colleagues with a research focus on Africa published in this series (Neumann & Scott 2018). Joyce Coetzee and Luis Scott were among his most important students. Coetzee became well known for her study of the sediment record of Sacred Lake on Mount Kenya (Coetzee 1964). Van Zinderen Bakker’s fieldwork by Land Rover covered most countries in southern Africa during a time when travelling and fieldwork were not complicated by political unrest. At an early stage he rejected the widely accepted ‘pluvial theory’ which hypothesised that cold periods (glacials) in the temperate zones coincided with ‘pluvials’ in the tropics (Maarleveld & Van der Hammen 1959; Van Zinderen Bakker 1966). He played a central role in the South African Society of Quaternary Research (SASQUA). He initiated pollen-based studies on African past environments, human occupation and climate, starting an African pollen reference collection, and supporting archaeological excavations (Coetzee 2002). He paved the way for many French and British pollen analysts beginning their studies in the African tropics in the 1960s and 1970s.

Thomas van der Hammen (1924‒2010; main period of publications 1949‒2010) studied geology at Leiden University. After World War II he undertook doctoral research with Van der Verk and Florschütz as his supervisors on the Late glacial and Holocene of the district of Twente, eastern Netherlands, obtaining his PhD degree with a thesis on ‘Late-glacial flora and periglacial phenomena in the Netherlands’ (Van der Hammen 1951). This was followed by a career at the national geological survey of Colombia in Bogotá. He developed a method to describe systematically Tertiary pollen grains, supporting stratigraphical and geochronological studies extending back to the Cretaceous Epoch. He published frequently in the Colombian ‘Boletin Geológico’ and in the Dutch ‘Geologie en Mijnbouw’ currently the ‘Netherlands Journal of Geosciences’ (Hooghiemstra et al. 2010). Although working for the geological survey and focusing on earlier geological periods, his interests in the Quaternary remained and this led him to organise the first deep drilling of the sedimentary basin of Bogotá. This basin was a seemingly inexhaustible source of information for the Pleistocene ice ages. He demonstrated the unprecedented potential to develop a pollen record of the evolution of flora, vegetation and climate in the northern Andes (Van der Hammen et al. 1973; Van der Hammen 1974), which was to be continued by H. Hooghiemstra and others later (Hooghiemstra 1984; Torres et al. 2013). Van der Hammen returned to the geological institute in Leiden in 1959 where he succeeded retiring Frans Florschütz as head of department. In 1966 Van der Hammen was appointed at the University of Amsterdam where he established a research group in (tropical) palaeoecology. He maintained strong and extensive contacts with Colombia and developed substantial multi-year research programmes in the Colombian Andes (Ecoandes project) and in the Colombian part of Amazonia (Tropenbos-Colombia). He trained a cohort of Colombian and Dutch PhDs in geology as well as in Quaternary geo-ecology. Many of his students obtained academic positions and developed new research groups in geology, tropical ecology and Quaternary palaeoecology in Colombia. Van der Hammen’s visionary understanding of Colombian ecosystems was well known and displayed in many books and book chapters published in Colombia. Van der Hammen’s dedication, energies and enthusiasm were marked at various stages (Hooghiemstra et al. 2010; Van der Hammen 2016).

Tjalling Waterbolk (1924‒2020; main period of publications 1944–2020) visited Iversen’s laboratory in 1951 to be trained in pollen analysis. In 1951 Tjeerd van Andel introduced Waterbolk as his successor in the palynological research for BPM, later renamed ‘Shell’. Waterbolk worked at central laboratory in the Netherlands from 1951 to 1953 and focused particularly on samples from Nigeria, but he also worked on samples from Colombia, New Guinea and British Borneo (Bazelmans & Kolen 2015, 2019; Waterbolk 2019). He was involved in the ground-breaking article ‘The application of palynology to oil geology with reference to western Venezuela’ (Kuyl et al. 1955). He contributed with a chapter on pre-Quaternary palynology in the ‘Text Book of Pollen Analysis’ (Faegri & Iversen 1964).

Johan H. Germeraad (1920‒2001) studied geology at Utrecht University and was trained by Florschütz. He was the lead author of ‘Palynology of Tertiary sediments from tropical areas’ (Germeraad et al. 1968). This classic article reflected a rare consensus from the ‘Bataafse Internationale Petroleum Maatschappij’, ‘Shell-BP Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria’, the Venezuelan ‘Creole Petroleum Corporation’ and the ‘Mene Grande Oil Company’, to prepare and publish a compilation of pollen-based biostratigraphical understanding. Most of Germeraad’s output concerned confidential reports. He was possibly also trained in palynology at Shell’s laboratory and he was without doubt one of the key researchers of the Maracaibo team. The life and work of Germeraad is otherwise largely hidden in the confidential archives of oil companies. The Maracaibo Laboratory left an unprecedented modern pollen reference collection of some 4000 slides of northern South America and Nigeria, currently lodged at the University of Amsterdam.

Jan Muller (1921‒1983; main period of publications 1955‒1983) was an agricultural botanist. He was trained by Florschütz to work as a pollen biostratigrapher for Shell in Maracaibo, Venezuela. during the period 1946–1958. As a Shell employee he wrote at least 27 confidential reports between 1948 and 1966. While working in Maracaibo, he published ‘Palynology of recent Orinoco delta and shelf sediments’ (Muller 1959). From 1958 to 1964 he continued his work for Shell in Borneo. He published on southeast Asian palynology in international journals (Kalkman 1984) and he returned to Shell Central Palynological Laboratory in Rijswijk where he compiled more confidential reports from 1964 to 1967. Jan Muller completed his career with a position at the Rijksherbarium in Leiden where he focused on pollen morphology of tropical genera, and evolutionary palynostratigraphy. His articles ‘Fossil pollen records of extant angiosperms’ (Muller 1981) and ‘A palynological zonation scheme for the Cretaceous, Tertiary, and Quaternary of northern South America’ (Muller et al. 1987) are among his most well-known (Nilsson 1984). He was honoured by the naming of a new fossil pollen genus, Janmulleripollis, from the Eocene of Venezuela (Di Giacomo & Van Erve 1987).

Willem van Zeist (1924‒2016; main period of publications 1950‒2009; publications on the Middle-East 1963‒2009) was an archaeological palaeobotanist. In 1961 he was invited to stay for a year at Herb Wright’s new pollen laboratory in Minnesota, USA (Birks 2015). There, Van Zeist became familiar with ongoing archaeological research concerning sites mentioned in the Bible. He travelled with Herb Wright to Iran where they obtained a core from Lake Zeribar (Van Zeist & Wright 1963). After his sabbatical in Minneapolis, Van Zeist continued his research focus on the Middle East and explored archaeological sites, for instance in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq (Hooghiemstra & Birks 2017). Sytze Bottema (1937‒2005) joined Van Zeist in his research in the Middle East and together they formed an important team studying the history of vegetation, climate and human occupation in the region. From Bottema we know that Dutch embassies and consulates in these countries facilitated their fieldwork. Van Zeist and Bottema developed the foundations of our paleaoecological understanding of the arid countries of the Middle East (Van Zeist & Bottema 1991). They showed how changes in past precipitation patterns had shifted the boundary between natural agriculture and irrigation-agriculture. This work was expanded later by key researchers such as Alan Horowitz (e.g. Horowitz 1992) who studied palynology in the 1960s with Van der Hammen in Leiden and returned in 1974 on sabbatical to Van der Hammen’s laboratory in Amsterdam.

From ‘pollen analysis’ to ‘palynology’

Pollen analysis renamed in 1944. — In 1944 ‘Pollen analysis’ was renamed ‘palynology’ for good reasons but a number of developments were unforeseen. As a consequence the history of ‘pollen analysis’ is a different one than the history of ‘palynology’ (Jansonius & McGregor 1996; Edwards & Pardoe 2018). This change occurred midway through the career of Florschütz but no evidence has been found that he paid much attention to it. Pollen analysis in sediment sequences developed steadily as a biostratigraphical tool (Birks & Berglund 2016). After the last ice age, arboreal vegetation returned to Western Europe from the refugia around the Mediterranean (e.g. Van der Hammen et al. 1971) and once the sequence of immigration of tree species in Western Europe was established (e.g. Iversen 1973; Zagwijn 1989) it could be used as a tool for relative dating of sediments. As documented in the rich correspondence from the 1940s and 1950s between many industries and governmental organisations, Florschütz was frequently asked to analyse samples and to contribute with his understanding to solve biostratigraphical problems. Applications of pollen analysis had become instrumental in stratigraphy. In the 1940s there was a need to train biostratigraphers academically and to further develop scientifically the array of applications. As the term ‘pollen analysis’ referred too much to a ‘method’ rather than of a ‘science’, Hyde and Williams (1944), working in allergy research, wondered about the correctness of the name ‘pollen analysis’. They coined the term ‘palynology’ as a broader term including applications and inferences on the basis of fossil pollen, other spores and their dispersal (Hyde & Williams 1944; Edwards & Pardoe 2018). This eloquent new term was well received and Boards of Governors of universities accepted the establishment of research groups in palynology, perceived as an important upcoming discipline in science.

Applied palynology expanded rapidly in 1950s and 1960s

In the 1950s and 1960s maceration techniques to retrieve microfossils from sediments and rock samples improved substantially. Apart from organic-walled pollen (gymnosperms, angiosperms) and spores (ferns, fern-allies and fungi) oil biostratigraphers were presented with organic-walled dinoflagellate cysts and acritarchs. A sample sent to a contractor for pollen analysis was expected to be assessed for its full spectrum of observations. ‘Palynology’ as originally coined (Hyde & Williams 1944) developed into an even broader field of research (Berggren 1978; Haq & Boersma 1978). Laboratory practice was important to how ‘palynology’ developed. Dinoflagellate cysts and acritarchs required more or less the same ‘maceration’ preparation procedure as fossil pollen and consequently were studied along with fossil pollen and spores in the microscope slides from marine sediments. From the same bulk samples other marine microfossils, such as foraminifera, were extracted using different (i.e. non-maceration) preparation procedures, primarily washing without acid or solvent treatment, sieving at various mesh sizes and then ‘picking’ of fossils using a low magnification light microscope. Specialists for pollen and spores, dinocysts and acritarchs, as well as for foraminifera, ostracodes, radiolarians, diatoms and conodonts generally were often not academically trained. Academically trained geologists integrated results and prepared the reports, just reflecting the practice in Florschütz’ pollen laboratory. As in the oil industry all botanical (palynologists’) and faunal (micropalaeontologists’) information became integrated, the opinion was put forward to bring a broader spectrum of microfossil proxy information under the umbrella-term ‘palynology’. In practice a wide range of calcareous-, siliceous-, phosphatic- and organic-walled microfossils became absorbed into ‘palynological’ research as is clearly expressed by the name ‘American Association of Stratigraphic Palynologists’ (AASP). In international academia the expansion of ‘palynology’ into a broad research field was less accepted and substantial disagreement prevailed about the closer alignment of ‘palynology’ and ‘micropalaeontology’. A merger was strongly advocated by Frits Jonker who had organised the second International Palynological Congress in Utrecht in 1966 (Visscher 1995). The closer integration of studies based on terrestrial and marine microfossils was reflected by the merger of the ‘Pollen Analysis Circular’ and ‘The Micropalaeontologist’ at the end of the 1950s and start of the 1960s. The latter was the precursor of the ‘Journal of Micropalaeontology’. In the 1960s the term ‘palynomorphs’ was used to refer to a broader spectrum of microfossils (Tappan 1980). In the domain of applied biostratigraphical research in the oil industry, terrestrial-based pollen analysis and marine-based micropalaeontology merged smoothly. Muller’s article ‘Palynology of recent Orinoco delta and shelf sediments’ (Muller 1959), and later Traverse and Ginsburg (1966), showed again the importance of fossil pollen to boost an understanding of how sediments were transported and accumulated in dynamic coastal and marine environments, important depositional settings where hydrocarbons often accumulate over geological time.

Pollen analysis in marine sediments: an unlucky start

The Ocean Drilling Project (ODP), starting in the 1960s, had the potential to integrate studies based on terrestrial and marine microfossils. However, pollen analysis in marine sediments made an unsuccessful start in the northern Western Atlantic by over-generalising poor results in a first explorative study (Groot & Groot 1966; see also Stanley 1966). Successive ODP cruises refrained from including pollen analysts in the seaboard parties. Authors of textbooks of palynology echoed these disappointing results (Faegri & Iversen 1989). In spite of this, Linda Heusser continued to demonstrate its relevance (Heusser 1978). After a delay of two decades, pollen analysis in marine sediment cores began to display successes with several Dutch pollen analysts having an important share in developments, such as Sander van der Kaars (e.g. Van der Kaars 2019a, 2019b), Henry Hooghiemstra (e.g. Hooghiemstra et al. 2006), Lydie Dupont (e.g. Dupont 2011) and Carina Hoorn (e.g. Hoorn et al. 2017).

Academic palynology matured conservatively and slowly

Applied palynology was rapidly driven by global energy demand but academic palynology developed at slower pace (Hooghiemstra et al. 2022). Pollen morphology received much attention (e.g. Erdtman 1952, 1954; Kremp 1965) and many pollen analysts (palynologists sensu Hyde & Williams 1944) developed a pollen atlas for their specific research area (Hooghiemstra & Van Geel 1998). In the academic domain, the Pleistocene history of tropical ecosystems was facilitated by John Flenley’s excellent synthesis ‘The equatorial rain forest: a geological history’ (Flenley 1974), which is perfectly complemented by Robert Morley’s book ‘Origin and Evolution of Tropical Rain Forests‘ (Morley 2000). The latter uses many previously unpublished examples derived from both industrial and academic palynological studies, and charts the development of tropical forests since the Cretaceous Epoch, more than 100 million years ago. The breadth of the research field of ‘palynology sensu lato’ that had developed is well illustrated by the scope of the journal ‘Marine Micropaleontology’, accepting articles ‘in all fields related to marine microfossils, including ecology and paleoecology, biology and paleobiology, paleoceanography and paleoclimatology’.

In academia, pollen-based teaching and research was located in departments of biology or geography, whereas teaching and research of marine microfossils was more often found in institutes of geology or oceanography. As an almost inevitable consequence, divergences arose between marine-oriented and terrestrially-oriented research groups. In this connection the following examples can be listed: fieldwork (coring vessels versus continental drilling), methods (sophisticated, fast methodology versus much manual labour), funding (international consortia funding versus small individual projects), journals (geological, micropalaeontological, and oceanographical journals versus biological, archaeological, geographical and Quaternary science journals), international societies (The Micropalaeontological Society versus International Union of Palynological Societies), and international congresses (International Conference of Palaeoceanography versus International Palynological Congress, and the European Palaeobotany and Palynology Conference). It may be observed that ‘micropalaeontologists’ do not tend to advertise themselves as ‘palynologists’, and vice versa. A diversity of opinions, in fact not following the (debated) proposal by Jonker at the International Palynological Congress in Lucknow (1976), can be found. Visscher (1995) writes ‘Leafing through presidential archive you may be impressed by his [F. Jonker] perseverance in opposing the deep-rooted prejudice that on an organizatorial level there should exist a strict separation between palaeopalynology, primarily related to geology, and actuopalynology, mainly related to biology’. The American Association of Stratigraphic Palynologists (Jansonius & McGregor 1996) and Alfred Traverse (Traverse 1988) accepted ‘palynology sensu lato’ in the broadest sense. However, Robert Tschudy and Richard Scott (Tschudy & Scott 1969) and Martin Brasier (Brasier 1980) continued using the term ‘palynology’ how it was originally coined.

The merger of ‘pollen analysis’ and some aspects of ‘marine micropalaeontology’ into ‘palynology’ implies that Lennart von Post (1884‒1951) is the founding father of ‘pollen analysis’, or ‘palynology sensu Hyde and Williams 1944’ but not of ‘palynology sensu lato’. For the Netherlands, Frans Florschütz (1887‒1965) is undoubtedly the nation’s founding father of ‘pollen analysis’, or ‘palynology sensu Hyde and Williams 1944’. Palynology developed into a hybrid field of research with strong terrestrial/botanical/academic and marine/geological/applied components. An understanding of the historical development is helpful for an appreciation of the different fields of ‘palynological research’.

Conclusions

1. Frans Florschütz combined understanding of palaeobotany, soils and geology to develop a pollen-based tool for relative age dating and laterally correlating multiple sediment profiles. In Utrecht he trained biologists in palaeoecology and in Leiden trained biostratigraphers in the oil industry to apply this method for the exploration of hydrocarbon reservoirs.

2. Pollen-based biostratigraphy developed in the 1920s to 1950s as a powerful tool in mapping soils, building large-scale infrastructure (canals, locks, tunnels, dikes, polders) and stratigraphic studies in the oil industry. Similar techniques are currently being applied to windfarm developments in the Dutch North Sea.

3. The term ‘pollen analysis’ referred too much to a methodology, and did not cover the wealth of potential additional information which was often available. Consequently, the eloquent term ‘palynology’, coined by Hyde and Williams (1944), was well received. ‘Palynology’ as a developing science became rapidly incorporated in the curricula of universities globally. In the Netherlands Florschütz founded centres of pollen-based research at the universities of Wageningen (c. 1924), Utrecht (c. 1929), Leiden (1948) and Nijmegen (1960), whereas Van der Hammen founded a palynological research group in Amsterdam (1966).

4. Although Hyde and Williams (1944) posed the term ‘palynology’ restrictively to the study of organic-walled microfossils with a terrestrial origin, in practice the term ‘palynology’ almost silently absorbed the study of a broader spectrum of microfossils, such as algal bodies, dinoflagellate cysts and acritarchs within terrestrial and marine sediments.

5. While in commercial biostratigraphy the full spectrum of microfossil information was used, in academia the analysis of pollen and spores (palynology sensu Hyde & Williams) resided mostly in departments of biology and geography and developed into a mature ‘palaeoecology’. The study of marine microfossils (palynology sensu lato) flourished in institutes of geology and oceanography, developing into a mature ‘palaeoceanography’ (e.g. Chambers 2002).

6. Although research objectives may overlap, the study of microfossils in terrestrial and marine sediments most often had separate trajectories, such as research institutes, development of fieldwork, improving methodology, organisation of research funding, publication outlets, different national disciplinary societies, and international congresses.

7. From the 1930s onwards Polak (southeast Asia), Jonker (Surinam), Van Zinderen Bakker (southern Africa), Muller (southeast Asia), Van der Hammen (northern South America), and Van Zeist and Bottema (Middle East) developed an initial understanding of tropical palynofloras. Early explorative pollen analysis of Tertiary to Cretaceous tropical sediments was developed by Kuyl, Muller, Germeraad, Hopping, Waterbolk and Van der Hammen, among others. The high proportion of Dutch researchers relates to the pioneering roles of Florschütz at Utrecht University, and the BPM/Shell at their laboratories in Maracaibo and The Hague.

8. Poor results from pollen analysis in first ODP cruises in the northwest Atlantic were initially over-generalised. Successive ODP cruises refrained from including an expert in pollen analysis. Authors of textbooks of palynology echoed disappointing results and pollen analysis in marine sediments stagnated. Linda Heusser, however, continued to show its relevance. Two decades later pollen analysis in marine sediment cores proved its success in (sub)tropical settings.

Acknowledgements

This article is based on a talk presented by Henry Hooghiemstra at the 30 September 2021 meeting of the Royal Netherlands Geology and Mining Society (KNGMG) and the Dutch ‘Palynologische Kring’. HH worked with the support of the Organisation for Scientific Research in the Tropics (WOTRO, The Hague) and Netherlands Organisation of Scientific Research (NWO, The Hague) as a pollen analyst and palaeoecologist in the terrestrial community, and with support from the Deutsche Bundesministerium für Forschung und Technologie (Bonn) as a marine palynologist in the community of marine geologists and palaeoceanographers. Consequently, unique points of view were experienced where both fields of research meet, diverge, and have aspects in common. Henk Visscher and Shirley van Heck provided much helpful information, and Kevin Edwards commented on an early draft of this article. We received additional information from Shell Historical Archive (The Hague), Noord-Hollands Archive (Haarlem), Evert van de Graaff (Voorschoten), Henk Schalke (Oegstgeest), Maria Antonieta Lorente (Houston), Clara van der Hammen (Bogotá), Hernando Dueñas (Bogotá) and Bob Morley (UK). The Florschütz family provided (February 2022) additional documents about Frans Florschütz’ period in Utrecht. Mick Bönnen is thanked for preparing the figures. Limi Mao (Nanjing) provided the Sonneratia photographs used in Figure 4. The authors thank two anonymous reviewers for constructive comments on an earlier draft of this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplementary material for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00173134.2022.2089226.