Nature and Metamorphosis: A Study of Carl Adolph Agardh’s Latin Dissertations and Monographs on Botany and Biology

Abstract

Carl Adolph Agardh (1785-1859), professor of botany and practical economy at Lund University, published a large corpus of Latin dissertations and monographs on the subjects of plant systematisation and plant physiology which merit a thorough examination both on account of their importance for the then contemporary natural science but also as they in hindsight consitute a corpus of Latin texts from the last period in which Latin was still a viable means of communication in the scientific community. Agardh’s most distinguished contribution to botany and biology is found in his works on algae, their systematisation and their physiology. An outcome of the latter is a theory concerning the metamorphosis of algae. The aim of the study is to analyse how Agardh verbalises these instances of metamorphosis in his Latin works, with a focus on the dissertation De metamorphosi algarum from 1820.To understand the observations of metamorphosis, Agardh’s underlying conception of nature is first examined. It displays influences from German idealism, in particular from the German philosopher F. J. W. von Schelling, from the Swedish Linnaean tradition, and from vitalism, a theory which was then prevalent among international naturalists. The outcome of the analysis of the verbalisations of metamorphosis is that Agardh neither establishes a defined terminology nor coins any neologisms to cope with the descriptions of metamorphosis. Instead, he uses already extant non-technical Latin terms and expressions signifying change to provide detailed and exact descriptions of each instance of metamorphosis. Thus, Agardh’s verbalisations ofcthe observations of metamorphosis show that a defined Latin terminology is not a prerequisite for exactness in scientific descriptions.