19th century  Today

Charles Linné, Système des Plantes
Tome I, Chez Bruyset aîné et Buynand, Lyon, An XII - 1804
Bibliothèque de l'Ecole Nationale Supérieure Agronomique de Montpellier
Inv. Da 411 / 7305
Agropolis-Museum collections

Carl Von Linné,(Rashult, 1707 - Uppsala, 1778), a Suedish naturalist, invented a classification for plant and animal species by adopting a binary nomenclature. Under his classification each living being is caracterized by a gender and a species.

His work helped the knowledge of animals to increase from 400 known species by Aristote (4th century BP) up to 4400. The letter « L » which still follows the name of these species is for Linné’s initial.