Ulissi Aldrovandi

Aldrovandi's noble fanmily sent him to apprentice with merchants, but he found his vocation, after studying humanities and law at the universities of Bologna and Padua and becoming a notary. Successively his interests went out to philosophy and logic which he combined with the study of medicine. Accused of heresy in 1549 he was brought to Rome for judgement. While in semi-captivity there he became more and more interested in botanics, zoology and geology (apparently he can be credited for the invention/first written record of this word). Between 1551 and 1554 he organised several expeditions to collect plants for a herbarium. He obtained a degree in medicine and philosophy in 1553 and started teaching logic and philosophy in 1554 at the university of Bologna. In 1559 he became professor of philosophy and in 1561 he became the first professor of natural sciences at Bologna (lectura philosophiae naturalis ordinaria de fossilibus, plantis et animalibus). At his demand and under his direction a public botanic garden was created in Bologna in 1568. Due to a dispute on the composition of a popular medicine with the pharmacists and doctors of Bologna in 1575 he was suspended from all public position for five years. In 1577 he saught the aid of pope Gregory XIII (a cousin of his mother) who wrote to the authorities of Bologna to reinstate Aldrovandi in his public offices and request financial aid to help him publish his books. Throughout his life he gathered vast collections in botany and zoology which after his death passed on to the university museum.

List of works

Published during his life: