Josefine Skomars (Text)

Hammarby I Carl Linnaeus – The Prince of Flowers Josefine Skomars (Text) II The Master Herbarium The Linnean Society of London Josefine Skomars (Text and Images) III Precious as Gold Svalbard Global Seed Vault Josefine Skomars (Text) IV Tasha Tudor: The Soul of a Gardener Tovah Martin (Text) Richard W. Brown (Images) V Nuptiae Plantarum Ben Toms (Images) Janina Pedan (Text and Set design) Miranda Keyes (Glassware) VI My Love of Calla Lilies Anna - Sara Dåvik (Text and Image) VII Hammarby Christoffer Lundman (Text) Håkan Groth (Images) VIII Marble and Eggs George Henry Longly (Art and Images) Josefine Skomars (Text) IX Tulpangalenskapen och dess efterföljare Peter Englund (Text) Carl Linnaeus – The Prince of Flowers Josefine Skomars (Text) ‘Who would have thought that bluebells and lilies and onions could be up to such immorality?’ remarked the academician Johann Siegesbeck critically, after reading the eighteenth - century Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus’ lyrical accounts on pollination, the love life of plants. In his classification system for flora Linnaeus took human sexuality as his model: flowers served as perfumed bridal beds for husbands and wives to enjoy their wedding night in, with stamens acting as husbands, pistils as wives. Counting the numbers of ‘husbands’ and ‘wives’ of each flower, he described some polyandrous flowers as having ‘up to twenty males in the same marriage’, while other households had ‘one husband living with both his wife and his concubines’. Many of Linnaeus’ prudish peers were outraged by the erotic suggestions and scandalous implications of both polygamy and ‘loathsome harlotry’ in plants. Linnaeus avenged his critics by naming particularly unattractive weeds after them, Sigesbeckia orientalis (St Paul’s wort), after Siegesbeck, being one example. Mirroring the social prejudice of the time, he also imposed sexual discrimination on flora and fauna, with male characteristics ranked over female, and European people like himself classified as superior to people from other parts of the world. This faithful son of a small - town priest, who offended so many with his account of plant sexuality, had in fact set out to name and organize all God’s creatures. Giving two - word Latinate names to every known species, a system mimicking the name and surname given to humans, Linnaeus named many of the specimens then known, including Homo sapiens. Baptizing the species once created by God, Linnaeus at times considered himself a second Adam. While his critics lent their names to weeds, flowers that Linnaeus found particularly noble and beautiful were named in honour of his patrons and mentors. About the Linnaea borealis, named by the Dutch botanist Jan Frederik Gronovius after Linnaeus himself, he said in a moment of modesty: ‘lowly, insignificant, disregar- ded, flowering but for a brief space – from Linnaeus who resembles it’. Alexander Roslin, Carl von Linné, 1775, oil on canvas, 56 x 46 cm Nationalmuseum, Stockholm Linnaeus, his family name originating from the linden tree, was – his earthly paradise. He continued to explore the world through his born into a world of flora in the countryside of Småland in May 1707. ‘apostles’, who travelled the continents in search of specimens for their His father cared for an abundance of flowers on his small plot of land; master to classify. By the end of his life he had collected some 40,000 Linnaeus would later write that ‘this garden inflamed my mind from specimens and named 10,000 of them. His sexualized system of plant infancy onwards with an unquenchable love of plants.’ He slept in a cradle classification has since long been replaced, but the universal language decorated with fresh flowers, and whenever he was upset a plant to play of botany and horticulture invented by the ‘flower king’ is still in use. with made him content. When he later in life suffered pendulous mood As Linnaeus once wrote to his professor Olof Rudbeck, ‘So long as the swings between exuberance and melancholy, flowers were still his greatest earth shall survive, and as each spring shall see it covered with flowers, comfort. ‘I have no time to think of illness, Flora comes hastening with the Rudbeckia will preserve your glorious name.’ So will the Prince of all her beautiful companions,’ he said. Flowers, as he liked to title himself, be remembered through all the Constantly in search of new discoveries, at twenty - five Linnaeus species he named, so long as they and their earth shall survive. took a break from his medical studies and headed north on his first long voyage, hoping to find both botanical treasures and amass knowledge of the people of Lapland – the Nordic paradise yet little explored. Among the one hundred or so new specimens he brought back from his journey was the powder - pink twinflower, the plant that would be named Linnaea borealis. In search of international recognition as well as more exotic specimens, he soon set out on a voyage in Europe, travelling through Germany and the Netherlands to England, and back to Sweden. The gardens where the now famous Linnaeus settled became a destina- tion of pilgrimage among botanists, and admirers sent him letters and gifts from around the world. Philosopher Jean - Jacques Rousseau wrote, ‘I read you, I study you, I meditate upon you. I honour and love you with all my heart.’ Catherine II of Russia as well as Louis XV of France sent him gifts of seeds from their gardens, while the crown prince of Sweden, Adolf Fredrik, gifted him a racoon named Sjupp. The botanical offerings were planted in his gardens, where he had started another characteristically ambitious project: recreating the Garden of Eden. By acclimatizing the plants of the world to the Swedish climate he also hoped to make the country self - sufficient: he imagined Swedes shortly indulging in homegrown coffee and rice, and dressing in Swedish silk. That rhubarb, originally from Asia, is today grown in most Nordic gardens is one of the few successful results of this optimistic experiment. Linnaeus, later knighted Carl von Linné, lived with his wife and five children between the botanical gardens of the University of Uppsala, where he was a professor, and his small estate outside the city, Hammarby The Master Herbarium The Linnean Society of London Josefine Skomars (Text and Images) ‘A herbarium is better than any illustration; every botanist should make one,’ wrote Carl Linnaeus, his own herbarium containing more than 14,000 specimens. While Linnaeus had riches of plants, his financial situation remained unstable, and after his death in 1778 his wife Sara and their children were left with little else than books and dried specimens. Eventually Linnaeus’ widow decided to sell the voluminous botanical collection along with his zoological collection and his complete library, manuscripts and correspondence. She contacted the British botanist and explorer Joseph Banks, who was well acquainted with the work of Linna- eus. Banks, himself financially strained at that moment, recommended the fellow British botanist Sir James Edward Smith to make the invest- ment, and so the collections of the Swedish botanist ended up in England, arriving by ship in 1784. In 1788 Smith founded the Linnean Society, today the world’s oldest active biological society. Two of its most famous members, Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace, first presented their theory of evolu- tion at a meeting of the society – a theory inspired by Linnaeus’ taxonomy but ultimately overthrowing the Christian creation myth he had believed in. Today the Linnean Society continues to support research and scien- tific progress along with the work of preserving the collections of both Linnaeus and Smith that have been in its keeping since 1829. Located at Burlington House, the Piccadilly meeting place of science and art since 1854, the Linnean Society shares a courtyard with four other learned societies and the Royal Academy of Arts. The building is grand, its glass doors suitably decorated with flowers. Portraits in gilded frames, of Linnaeus as well as of the society’s presidents, decorate the ornate stairs to a library crowned by floral stucco. But it is in the basement, behind an anonymous blue door, that the herbarium is kept. In the climate - control- led room, stacks of thick envelopes share shelves with leather - bound books, letters and wooden drawers of insects, fish and shells. The paper envelopes, embraced by cotton ribbons, contain the plants gathered, pressed and named by Linnaeus three centuries ago. Characteristically well organized, the plants were mounted on paper – now yellowed by time – accompanied by their numbers and names inscribed in Linnaeus’ neat handwriting. To the faithful Linnaeus, God was the ultimate artist, and flowers his finest creations. Today, though the colours have faded, the beauty of his plants can still be seen through Linnaeus’ eyes. [ 01] Envelope containing plants from Linnaeus’ collection [ 02] Title page for the Rudbeckia collection [ 03] Passiflora caerulea [ 04] Rosa sp. [ 05] Narcissus bicolor [ 06] Trifolium subterraneum [ 07] Ipomoea pes – tigridis [ 08] Trifolium sp. [ 09] Calla aethiopica [ 10] Ficus carica [ 11] Scilla sp. [ 12] Lagoecia cuminoides [ 13] Phoenix sp. [ 14] Hibiscus tiliaceus [ 15] Nymphaea nelumbo [ 16] Amaryllis orientalis [ 17] Amaryllis formosissima [ 18] Cactus grandiflorus [ 19] Cactus phyllanthus [ 20] Linnaea borealis Precious as Gold Svalbard Global Seed Vault Josefine Skomars (Text) Svalbard, the cluster of Norwegian islands located in the Arctic Ocean, shelters roaming polar bears, Svalbard reindeers, Arctic foxes and around 2,000 humans on its rugged surface of glaciers and frozen tundra. One of its islands, Spitsbergen, is also sanctuary to more than one million seed samples from all over the world. These are stored at the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, situated 120 metres into the rocky depths of a moun- tain just outside the town of Longyearbyen.

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