Linnaeus: Nature and Nation

Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. Presumed first edition/first printing. Hardcover. Very good/very good. viii, 298 pages. Chronology. Map. Biographical References. Abbreviations. Notes. Works Cited; Index. Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 - 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement as Carl von Linne, was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who formalized the modern system of naming organisms called binomial nomenclature. He is known by the epithet "father of modern taxonomy."Drawing on letters, poems, notebooks, and secret diaries, Lisbet Koerner tells the moving story of one of the most famous naturalists who ever lived, the Swedish-born botanist and systematizer, Carl Linnaeus. The first scholarly biography of this great Enlightenment scientist in almost one hundred years, Koerner recounts for the first time her subject's grand and bizarre economic projects: to "teach" tea, saffron, and rice to grow on the Arctic tundra and to domesticate buffaloes, guinea pigs, and elks. This book evolved from the author's 1993 dissertation.