Alcide D'Orbigny (full name Alcide Charles Victor Marie Dessalines d'Orbigny) was born on the September 6, 1802 in Coueron, France. He and was a great naturalist.

Biography and Career :

His father was a doctor and an amateur naturalist. Since he has been a child he was attracted by the microscopic observation of shells.

In 1825 he published his work in a memoriam which brought him success and the reputation of a scientist man.

At the age of 24 Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle gave him the mission to study and collect species from the faun and flora of South America, almost unknown at that time.

He left France on 30 June 1826 for a three year journey. He traveled to Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo, Buenos Aires, Corrientes, Patagonia, Chile, Bolivia and Peru.
He came b ack in France after almost eight years in January 1834.

From 1840 he studied paleontology. In his work “The French Paleontology” he described thousands of species of invertebrate fossils. His discoveries are still valid.

Today he is known as a great figure of the world science. In his hole life he has suffered many disillusions, they refused him a paleontology cathedra until Napoleon the 3rd in 1853.

He described part of his findings in “La Relation du Voyage dans l'Amérique Méridional” and his contemporary, Charles Darwin, called this book "one of the great monuments of science in the 19th century".

He passed away on the 30th of June 1857 in the small town of Pierrefitte-sur-Seine, France.

The following genera and species were named in his honor :

- 1822 Haminoea orbignyana A. de Férussac
- 1826 Pink Cuttlefish, Sepia orbignyana Férussac
- 1832 Nerocila orbignyi
- 1851 Ampullaria dorbignyana Philippi, 1851
- 1858 Pinna dorbignyi Hanley, 1858
- 1889 Alcidia Bourguignat
_{Alcide D'Orbigny Image : wikipedia.org}

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Category: Writers  - ( Writers Archive)

Date Added: 26 October '06

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