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François Marie Daudin

French zoologist

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Biography

With legs paralyzed by childhood disease, he studied physics and natural history but ended up being devoted to the latter.

Daudin wrote Traité élémentaire et complet d'Ornithologie (Complete and Elementary Treatise of Ornithology) in 1799–1800. It was one of the first modern handbooks of ornithology, combining Linnean binomial nomenclature with the anatomical and physiological descriptions of Buffon. While an excellent beginning, it was never completed.

In 1800, he also published Recueil de mémoires et de notes sur des espèces inédites ou peu connues de mollusques, de vers et de zoophytes (Collection of memories and notes on new or little-known species of molluscs, worms and zoophytes).

Daudin found his greatest success in herpetology. He published Histoire naturelle des reinettes, des grenouilles et des crapauds (Natural history of tree frogs, frogs and toads) in 1802, and Histoire naturelle, générale et particulière des reptiles (Natural History of Reptiles) (8 volumes) in 1802–1803. This latter work contained descriptions of 517 species, many for the first time, based on examining over 1100 specimens.

He was assisted by his wife "Adèle" (Adélaïde Geneviève de Grégoire de Saint-Sauveur, born 1774), who drew the illustrations. Although his books were commercial failures the couple did not live in poverty, due to the family fortune. She died of tuberculosis in late 1803, and he followed shortly thereafter, also of tuberculosis, not yet 30 years old.

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