The Curious Death of Peter Artedi Read online

  I was made aware of this deplorable situation at Uppsala not only from the heartfelt complaints told to me later by my friend, but also more directly from personal experience as well. While still at the University of Lund, where I had gone in the summer of 1727, my old benefactor Dr. ROTHMANN advised me to leave that city and remove myself to Uppsala, where the good doctor assured me I would meet with considerably greater advantages for the completion of my medical studies. There I would find the celebrated Professors ROBERG and RUDBECK, a very rich library, and a most extensive botanical garden to help gratify my unquenchable thirst for botany. Eagerly adopting my kind patron’s advice, I betook myself to Uppsala, where, for all the reasons lamented by ARTEDI, I soon repented my decision. Yes, it is true that RUDBECK gave a course of study about his Birds of Sweden, which animals, by the way, were very cleverly drawn and colored. And just before the first Easter of my arrival, ROBERG gave four public lectures on De Historia Animalium (Natural History of Animals) of ARISTOTLE, in light of the principles of DESCARTES, and lectured privately as well on Praxis Medica (Medical Practice)—I attended all of them, but like the others I was disappointed; in the circumstance it was better to buy the books. But during those days at Uppsala no one heard or saw any anatomy, nor anyone any chemistry. I myself never had the opportunity of attending a single lecture on botany, either private or public. Nor, might I add, was there anything to speak of in the way of collections or other materials pertaining to instruction in natural history, those curiosities that might have once filled the cabinets of ROBERG and RUDBECK long since gone to the deprivations of time. It is thus not a question to be debated: the student of natural science in our day, at Uppsala and elsewhere in our country, was almost wholly dependent upon his own ability to teach himself the knowledge he sought to acquire. Those men who called themselves teachers were not in any position to afford him more than the most meager of assistance. However, despite these unexpected and disappointing, might I say deplorable, circumstances, ARCTAEDIUS applied himself with great assiduity—much as I did myself—to his chosen branch of science, and, thanks to his good parts, he was soon accounted one of the most promising of the students attached to the medical faculty, a development moreover proven by the events that were to follow.

  Chapter 2

  My Most Intimate Friend

  It seems to have been a case of instantaneous mutual attraction….

  —NORAH GOURLIE, The Prince of Botanists, 1953

  I ARRIVED AT Uppsala in early September of 1728, where, unbeknownst to me, for I had not met nor had I heard mention of him, ARTEDI had taken up residency four years prior—it was during his years here at the university that he took the direction to change his family name from ARCTAEDIUS to ARTEDI, that designation by which I knew him and the name with which he made his mark. Here, in this town, determined as I was to study natural science, I immediately sought to make the acquaintance of others of like mind. But when I asked for the names of students engaged in similar studies, I was told, and very much surprised to hear, that there were none with this inclination in all of Uppsala save PETER ARTEDI. In fact, this ARTEDI, as I soon learned, was foremost in everyone’s mind in this connection, for it was evident that he was the only medical student who at the time had distinguished himself by his diligence and erudition. Notwithstanding these wide praises for his expertise related to things of the natural world, I was told also, and soon learned for myself, that he was quite capable in other departments as well. He was exceedingly well versed in literature and modern languages, was a profound philosopher, and possessed a sound knowledge of medicine. He had the power, moreover, of giving the most admirable addresses on many different subjects, wherein he displayed keen judgment and a thorough acquaintance with his topic, so that none of his listeners, on leaving the lecture room, could fail to accord him the distinction of being a very great and learned man.

  Intrigued to discover also that this ARTEDI had, very much the same as I, given up theology for the wonders and joys of nature, I asked further for his whereabouts. Imagine my disappointment upon discovering that he had taken himself some weeks before back to his home village of Nordmaling, whither he had been summoned by the news of an illness of his father, which eventually ended in the poor man’s death.

  As I was later told by ARTEDI himself, and could witness first hand by examination of the result, the interval spent by my friend in Nordmaling—a trying time to be sure, to witness the slow lapse of life of him to whom you owe your being—was not entirely spent at the bedside. He took this opportunity to complete a work that he had begun many years before as a young boy: “A Short List of the Trees, Bushes, and Plants that are Indigenous to the Glebe-Lands in Nordmaling and Villages Lying Within Its Immediate Vicinity.” Seeing this manuscript, although small and of little importance to the larger aspects of our science—giving little more than a record of the flora of Nordmaling at that time—I was surprised to see the scholarship. He, through this effort, quite plainly demonstrated a profound knowledge and following of the system introduced by the great TOURNEFORT, as so well laid out in the latter’s Institutiones rei Herbariae, yet ARTEDI entered a number of new things for which I had had no previous thoughts. It is certainly the case, in the productions of both authors, that the orders that hold the trees and bushes are placed separately by themselves, and well separated from the orders that contain the herbaceous phanerogams (plants of a seed-producing kind, in which male and female genitalia are easily seen), which embrace as well the cryptogams (plants in which seeds cannot be found and genitalia are well hidden, including algae, fungi, mosses, and ferns). But, while TOURNEFORT ends his classification with the trees and bushes, ARTEDI, quite surprisingly, starts off with them from the very beginning. This innovation, in addition to a large number of other independent modifications in the overall presentation, constitutes, I must say, rather remarkable improvements. Of other quite favorable enhancements, let me just mention but a few. Coniferous trees and that group that holds the birch-alder assemblage were combined as one by TOURNEFORT, whereas ARTEDI divides them into two well-differentiated parts. The bird-cherry is accepted by ARTEDI to contain the stone-fruit, and in his presentation, it is well separated from bilberries, red whortleberries, and their ilk; whereas, the renowned French botanist weds not only all of these species as one, but combines them together with the elder-tree, the honeysuckle, and other more-or-less related forms, in one and the same grouping. Horsetail and nettles, if one will believe ARTEDI, have little or nothing to do with one another, situated in the latter’s classification in quite distant sections, whereas TOURNEFORT combines them all, together with hemp, the hop, spinach, Mercurialis, etc. In like manner, Pyrola and the water-lilies, according to ARTEDI, must rightly be contained within two quite different classes, but TOURNEFORT, seemingly ignorant of the large distinctions between these two, puts them together along with Hypericum, that beneficial vegetable better known to most as St. JOHN’S wart. And so it goes on, much the same in this way, these few examples being only small indications of the independent points of view—of which I took full notice and committed all to memory for my own future employment—well expressed by my good friend. All in all, I must admit that I was somewhat more than astonished that this newcomer to natural history, albeit only two years my senior, could have accomplished such a feat in the way that I saw it in its final form. But, no matter—the work, dated by its author 24 February 1729, as we shall see, was never published, and what is not published, does not exist.

  Discharging the last duties to his dear departed father, the obligations of which detained ARTEDI at Nordmaling throughout the winter, he did not return to Uppsala until late March 1729, at which time I sought him out immediately, as I was quite anxious to meet this fellow student. I can still remember in vivid detail our first encounter: I saw him before me, lofty of stature and spare of figure; his hair was long and his face reminded me of that of JOHN RAY’S. He struck me as humble-minded, not hasty in forming an opinion, but
yet prompt, firm and withal mature, a man of old-world honor and faith. It rejoiced me to remark that our talk turned at once upon stones, plants, and animals, and I was much moved at having so many of his scientific observations confided to me without the least hesitation or reserve, upon that very first occasion on which we met. I sought his friendship, and so far was he from withholding it, that he promised me his services too, if such I needed, a promise he afterwards most loyally kept. This sacred friendship, thus spontaneously sealed, we fostered uninterruptedly for almost six years in Uppsala, at all times with the same fidelity, but with ever-increasing warmth and attachment. He was my closest and most intimate friend, and I was his.

  * * *

  I must admit, and I have no qualms in saying this outright, men from an early age were the center of my emotional world. Women as such always held a distant second place—I abhorred them in general and was disgusted by their bodily functions; yet, at the same time too, and again this is an admission that I do not feel ashamed to utter, I occasionally felt sexually attracted to them. I especially had no fondness whatsoever for scholarly women. Thus, I strictly forbade my daughters, of which I was later to have a total of four, to attend school of any kind. To my way of thinking, it was the duty of a wife to bring their daughters up as good housekeepers and mothers. Very often having one or more of my poor and hungry students to my house for dinner, I always made invitations of this kind dependent on a solemn promise that they not bring with them books from which French or such things could be learnt. Although I did my best to refrain from it, I did not seldom find myself lecturing severely of feminine customs, and here I give but one example: Women clothe themselves in our terrible winter as if they were out in an Italian summer; could a spider web hold them, it would please them better. Outside Europe one never sees the whole of a woman’s face exposed, but here with us the face is not big enough, but they need show themselves down to their breasts, and thus add half the body to the face, which is both a wicked and injurious treachery with which to beguile men. Such misses complain over the least draught in the house, but in church or when out elsewhere, where they will show their rank, they can sit with a bared breast and that with goodly patience; and the better to attract men’s eyes, they hang gold chains, pearl necklaces, and diamond crosses round the neck and on the breast. All my life I felt a strong need to wage a war against these and other senseless conventions.

  I regarded women and marriage as economic necessities, which men need and could undertake because women, being fools, marry for love. When I was a bachelor, without stable means, and unable therefore to make my way in the world, I knew quite well that I had no other alternative but to pay my addresses to some young lady of fortune, who first could make me happy and then I her. I then proceeded to do just that, securing the knot of matrimony in June 1739 to one SARA ELISABET MORAEA, daughter of JOHAN MORAEAUS, the physician at the Falun copper mines in the province of Dalecarlia, where I spent the Christmas holiday of 1734, with my long-time companion and fellow student CLAES SOHLBERG, at his house in that town. People would not have hesitated to call this Dr. MORAEAUS wealthy, for certainly in this poor region of west central Sweden, he was truly the richest of all. Yet I was to be disappointed later on to finally realize that my father-in-law was quite fond of his money and did not want to give up any part of it to his son-in-law.

  As for the true direction of my emotional outlets, I sincerely loved my students. In fact, they were the only real objects of my love, apart from my young daughters—ELISABET CHRISTINA, born 1743; LOVISA, 1749; SARA CHRISTINA, 1751; and SOPHIA, 1757—and my many animals. Loving all things imbued with life, I kept over the years numerous dogs, cats, parrots, and monkeys. I most fondly adored a gentle raccoon to which I gave the name SJUBB and which, I might add, was the subject of one of my most delightful papers: “The Description of an American Animal given by his Royal Highness for Research,” published by me in the Proceedings of the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences in 1747. To my great sorrow this most pleasing creature came to a tragic end, attacked and killed by a large and mangy dog. After searching hard for several days we eventually found his body, upon which I immediately performed a detailed dissection, being especially interested in the curious structure of the raccoon’s sexual organs.

  As for my students, I always made a point to give them praise openly and extravagantly, even on occasion when it was not warranted or much deserved. I gave them all pet names and called them my “mates” and my “apostles.” I struggled and fought for them as best I could. I secured scholarships for them when it was possible; and when it was not, I augmented their means liberally from my own purse. When sufficiently aroused, that being more my normal attitude than anything else, I warmed them with my enthusiasm and spurred them on. To the obvious recoil of some outsiders looking in, I often took to hugging them and kissing them in public view. Firm in the belief that the shape of the head holds significance as to intellectual attributes, I often examined, in public as well, the outer form of the skull of my most beloved disciples to judge each one’s memory, intelligence, and inclinations.

  Many of my students were quite good-looking. FALCK was, I well remember, quite tall, upright, muscular, and handsome—the face was oval, manly, and pleasing. PEHR LÖFLING, not unlike FALCK in his fine appearance, was often my captive slave as I dictated my Philosophia Botanica (Philosophy of Botany, one of my greatest works, which you will remember I published at Stockholm in 1751) and other products of my labors to him from my bed, a secretarial duty that he sincerely told me he did not want ever to end. It may sound silly now, but I distinctly recall missing one of my favorites so badly that I wrote to a friend begging that he “take burning firebrands and throw them at Professor KALM so that he might come without delay to Uppsala, for I long for him as a bride for the hour of one o’clock at night.”

  We were a fine lot indeed, the good Professor and his mates. They truly loved me and I them. The extent to which together this band of eager boys promoted and advanced the study of natural history cannot be easily measured, but leave it to say that in no kingdom in Europe, might I say, in all the world, could botany be said to be in a more flourishing state. I well recall with deep fondness our glorious summer forays made every Wednesday and Saturday, marching over hill and valley, with my flock of 200 or more pupils, collecting plants and insects, and any other living thing save those larger curiosities that were either too strongly tied down or could more easily escape our grab. We made observations of every kind, shot birds, stuck pins in grasshoppers, dissected worms, and kept close minutes of every action and discovery. After botanizing from seven o’clock in the morning till nine at evening time, we returned triumphant, with flowers in our hats, dancing and singing, the Father surrounded by his children, with drums and trumpets blaring, through the city to the garden of Uppsala. Foreigners and people of distinction from Stockholm and other places often attended these gay excursions; indeed, at this time, and under my profound guidance and persistent force, the science of nature had attained the highest degree of popularity. I was very much esteemed and well loved by all.

  Despite the almost inescapable emotional attachment that I had for my students, I was always careful to keep my distance in the sense that they were never my friends, the reason for this having to do with how I saw the results of their work in relationship to mine. As it should be, I always believed quite fervently that I alone should be given the sole credit for the work that they did. While I certainly mourned, for example, the premature death of LÖFLING in 1756, I was disturbed more at the thought that I was just about to further science through his assiduous work and that this opportunity by his permanent and early departure had been lost. I always believed myself to have a kind of right to see and describe first those plants that my apostles found, and greatly appreciated that politeness on their part. When a few times I found that courtesy lacking, I could not control my profound disapproval.

  From an early time, I resolutely encouraged, and
in later years made it almost a requirement—might I say more like a duty that could not be circumvented—that my students travel to distant lands for the purpose of exploration of unknown places, and for the discovery and acquisition of natural objects of divers kinds. Now it was that these journeys were arduous to the extreme, some more so than others, demanding more than normal human strength, and often leading to dire results. More than once, as instigator and sponsor, I sent members of my beloved flock to martyrdom in the name of science. By pestilence or accident, all for the promotion of discovery, lives were given, and given gladly in that supreme and precious quest to add to universal knowledge, through which the Professor and our nation might shine more brightly among all learned peoples. The first to go in this way was my dear TÄRNSTRÖM, a beautiful boy and intimate companion on many of my botanical forays around Uppsala, with whom I charged, among other things, the task of procuring a growing tea bush in a pot, or at least seed of this valuable plant. I requested also that he bring me a living goldfish that I might present it to Her Majesty Queen LOVISA ULRIKA for her collection—which, I might here interject, was quite excellent, more so in the departments of shells and insects than any other, many procured from the Indies, and rivaling the finest in the world—in exchange for still more royal gratitude and favor. TÄRNSTRÖM was the best of the lot, having progressed so far in botany that no one in the Kingdom could compare with him; but, alas, in 1746, well before he had a chance to do anything for me of importance, he died in Cochin China of a tropical fever, an event that struck me like a hammer and made me unendingly miserable.