MEMOIR OF C. F. P. -VON MARTIUS.* 



By CiiAKLKS Rau. 



The family of tbe celebrated botanist and ethnologist, to whose mem- 

 ory this sketch is dedicated, traces its origin back to Galeottns Mar- 

 tins, a famous physician and astrologer, born in 1427, at Narui, in 

 Umbria. About the year 1450 he occupied a professorial chair at 

 Padua, but, persecuted by the Inquisition on account of reformatory 

 tendencies and compelled to leave Ita»y, he subsequently went to the 

 court of the learned King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary, who ap- 

 pointed him his counsellor and librarian. The descendants of Galeot- 

 tns mostly spread themselves over Germany, and many are known to 

 have j)ursued learned professions, thus forming- an ancestry worthy of 

 their distinguished successor. 



Carl Friedri(;h Philipp von Martins was born on the 17th of April 

 1794, at Erlangen, Bavaria, where his father, Ernst Wilhelm Martius, 

 owned an apothecary establishment, holding at the same time the po- 

 sition of honorary professor of pharmacy in the university of that city. 

 A man of superior general acquirements, he was especially interested 

 in botany, and has left some writings relative to his favorite study. At 

 the advanced age of ninety, he publislied an interesting and well-writ- 

 ten book, containing recollections of his long and eventful life. He 

 died in 1840, in his ninety-third year. 



His eldest son, the subject of this sketch, was carefully educated at 

 home and in the schools of Erlangen. At an early age he already dis- 

 played the germs of those talents which afterward made him conspicu- 

 ous in the world of letters, and, Avlien still quite young, he manifested 

 a determined resolution to devote himself to a scientific career. Though 

 his juvenile inclinations leaned toward natural history, he also exhibited 

 much taste for the study of ancient classics, a tendency which, nurtured 

 by skillful teachers, not only develoi)ed and strengthened his intel- 

 lectual capacities, but also enabled him, when in alter years he 

 composed many of his writings in Latin, to express himself in 

 that language with a precision and elegance not often met with 

 in our time. In fact, during his whole life the reading of Latin 

 and Greek authors formed one of his principal recreations. When 

 only sixteen years of age, Martius w^as admitted, in 1810, as a 

 student in the university of his native town. He had decided to 

 prepare himself for the medical i)rot'ession, chiefly because this study 

 afforded hiui the widest field for indulging in his love for natural 

 sciences. His favorite branch, botany, was then taught at Erlangen by 

 a pupil of Linnanis, the learned Schreber, who does not seem, however, 

 to have been gifted with a happy method of imparting information j 

 hence Martius and his fellow-students felt more attracted by the lectures 



* Note.— It is l)iit fair to state that most of tlio facts contain oil in this sketch have been 

 furnished by C. F. Meissner'n DeiiLschrift aiif Carl Fricdr. Fhil. von Martiu.'i, (Munich, 

 18G9.) The article Cnii PMUpp von Martins, sein Leben und seine Leistungen, la the 

 Ansland, (No. 38, 1869,) has also been used. 



