Louis Agassiz (1807–1873)
Author of A journey in Brazil
About the Author
Born at Motier, Switzerland, Louis Agassiz was taught by his parents until the age of ten. Later, as a penurious student and professor in Paris, this Swiss naturalist and geologist studied fish classification and produced the monumental five-volume treatise on extinct marine organisms, Recherches show more sur les poissons fossiles (1833--43). His second period of research was devoted to the study of Swiss glaciers. The results were published as Etudes sur les glaciers (1840). The widespread hunger for scientific knowledge in the early nineteenth century took Agassiz to the United States in 1846, where he became a professor of zoology and geology at Harvard University. A skilled lecturer and popular and devoted teacher, Agassiz revolutionized the study of natural history by promoting the open-minded observation and interpretation of nature, as opposed to reliance on traditional classification systems. The Agassiz approach was adopted by an entire generation of scientists. Agassiz established a museum of comparative zoology, now the Agassiz Museum at Harvard. His famous "Essay on Classification" is included in his four-volume Contributions to the Natural History of the United States (1857-62). The poet Ezra Pound ranked Agassiz as a writer of prose whose precise knowledge of his subject led to great exactitude of expression. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Disambiguation Notice:
Full name: Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz
Image credit: Courtesy of the NYPL Digital Gallery
(image use requires permission from the New York Public Library)
(image use requires permission from the New York Public Library)
Works by Louis Agassiz
Principles of Zoölogy: Touching the Structure, Development, Distribution, and Natural Arrangement of the Races of… (1863) 7 copies
Correspondence Between Spencer Fullerton Baird and Louis Agassiz - Two Pioneer American Naturalists (1963) 5 copies
Introduction to the Study of Natural History : Edited and Annotated by Christoph Irmscher (2017) 3 copies
LECTURES ON COMPARATIVE EMBRYOLOGY 2 copies
Geological sketches second series 2 copies
An Introduction to the Study of Natural History: In a Series of Lectures Delivered in the Hall of the College of… (2010) 1 copy
Contributions To The Natural History Of The United States Of America, Volume 2, Part 3... (2011) 1 copy
Principles of Zoology, Vol. 1: Touching the Structure, Development, Distribution, and Natural Arrangement of the Races… (2017) 1 copy
Recherches Sur Les Poissons Fossiles, Vol. 1: Contenant L'Introduction Et Toutes Les Questions Generales, Anatomiques,… (2017) 1 copy
Tribune popular science 1 copy
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Agassiz, Jean Louis Rodolphe
- Birthdate
- 1807-05-28
- Date of death
- 1873-12-14
- Burial location
- Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Switzerland (birth)
USA (naturalized) - Birthplace
- Môtier, Switzerland
- Place of death
- Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
- Places of residence
- Bienne, Switzerland (education)
Lausanne, Switzerland (education)
Zürich, Switzerland (education)
Heidelberg, Germany (education)
Munich, Germany (education)
Paris, France - Education
- University of Zürich
University of Heidelberg
University of Munich (doctor of medicine)
University of Erlangen-Nuremberg (Ph.D.) - Occupations
- zoologist
geologist
glaciologist
paleontologist
ichthyologist
author (show all 12)
writer
scientist
professor (zoology and geology, Harvard University)
director (Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University)
lecturer (Cornell University)
lecturer - Relationships
- Agassiz, Elizabeth Cabot Cary (spouse)
Agassiz, Alexander (son) - Organizations
- Harvard University (Professor of zoology and geology)
Museum of Comparative Zoology (Founder and director) - Awards and honors
- Wollaston Medal (1836)
- Disambiguation notice
- Full name: Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz
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Reviews
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Statistics
- Works
- 33
- Also by
- 1
- Members
- 149
- Popularity
- #139,413
- Rating
- 3.6
- Reviews
- 1
- ISBNs
- 28
- Languages
- 1