Bernard de Jussieu

Jussieu, a modest man, developed a naming system for plants that, unlike Linnaeus’s, was morphologically-based. Trained in medicine, he went with his elder brother (already a botanist) on a research trip to Spain, developing there into a botanist himself. Lamarck (his student and assistant for 18 years), Lavoisier and Guettard all studied with him; Buffon and Duhamel du Monceau were Jardin des Plantes colleagues. Sloane and Linnaeus (who attended his lectures and greatly respected him) corresponded. Réaumur prompted his investigation of fresh-water polyps (which he correctly identified as animal), while Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu was his nephew and successor.