36 
JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 
[Vol. 17 
should be mentioned if a complete history of our science is to be given. 
To give a complete or anywhere near a complete list is entirely too large 
an undertaking for such a short paper as this. Therefore only a few of 
the more striking personalities will be mentioned. 
As one of our great teachers, Oestlund, puts it, ‘The development of 
science follows the development of commerce and the gaining of riches. 
Then under a stable and strong government, science flourishes along with 
art, literature, and architecture and usually in educational centers.” 
It will be seen that this is true for we have in succession bright lights 
in Greece, Rome, Italy, The Netherlands, Germany, Scandinavia, 
France, England, and finally America. At certain stages great men 
have arisen in each of these centers. 
Undoubtedly there were great scientists in Egypt and probably good 
entomologists. That they knew something of insects we gather from 
Moses. He mentions tryxalines, crickets, locusts, etc. In the original 
Hebrew several species of locusts are mentioned for which the English 
translators had only the one word “locust.” 
Solomon was another of the Hebrews in contact with Egyptian civili¬ 
zation who knew considerable about the habits of insects. 
In ancient Greece the outstanding name is Aristotle (384-322 B.C.). 
He with his philosophy on the structure and development of animals 
was, as one writer says, the forerunner of the morphologist. He put 
considerable thought on the classification of animals and mentioned 
nearly 50 insects. 
In ancient Rome, Pliny (23-79 A. D.) was the great compiler but 
really added nothing to previous knowledge. He did much, however, to 
classify and to make popular. 
Passing thru the Middle Ages we come to Aldrovandi (1522-1607) in 
Italy. His principal work added much to the classification and general 
knowledge of insects. Redi (1626-1697) with his work on flesh flies 
took up the study from the experimental standpoint and put the theory 
of spontaneous generation into the discard. Malpighi (1628-1694) 
made wonderful advances in studies on the internal structure of insects. 
In the Netherlands Swammerdam (1637-1685) with his Bible of 
Nature became the true founder of structural entomology. He also 
worked on the metamorphosis of insects. 
In Germany, Gesner (1516-1565) “the modern Pliny” was a bright 
light. He was one of the greatest of compilers. Germany later pro¬ 
duced entomologists like Burmeister (1807-1892), Graber (1844-1892), 
and Ratzeburg (1801-1871). 
