Pierre François Marie Auguste Dejean
Encyclopedia
Amiens
Amiens is a city and commune in northern France, north of Paris and south-west of Lille. It is the capital of the Somme department in Picardy...
– March 17, 1845, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
), was a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
entomologist. A soldier of fortune during the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
, he rose to the rank of Lieutenant General and aide de campe to Napoleon. He amassed vast collections of Coleoptera some even collected on the battlefield at Waterloo
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
. He listed 22,399 species in his cabinets in 1837 at the time the greatest collection of Coleoptera in the world. In 1802 he began publishing a catalogue of his vast collection including 22,000 species names. Unfortunately Dejean was an opponent of the Principle of Priority
Principle of Priority
thumb|270px|Boa manditraIn zoology, the scientific study of animals, the Principle of Priority is one of the guiding principles of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, defined by Article 23....
in nomenclature
International Code of Zoological Nomenclature
The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature is a widely accepted convention in zoology that rules the formal scientific naming of organisms treated as animals...
. "I have made it a rule always to preserve the name most generally used , and not the oldest one; because it seems to me that general usage should always be followed and that it is harmful to change what has already been established". Dejean acted accordingly and often introduced in litteris names, given by himself to replace those already published by other authors. They became invalid. Dejean was president of the Société entomologique de France
Société entomologique de France
The Société entomologique de France, or French Entomological Society, is devoted to the study of insects. It was founded in 1832.The society was created by eighteen Parisian entomologists on January 31, 1832...
for the year 1840. In 1834, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences or Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien is one of the Royal Academies of Sweden. The Academy is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization which acts to promote the sciences, primarily the natural sciences and mathematics.The Academy was founded on 2...
.
Works
- Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean (1802–1837) with Charles Aubé
- with Pierre André LatreillePierre André LatreillePierre André Latreille was a French zoologist, specialising in arthropods. Having trained as a Roman Catholic priest before the French Revolution, Latreille was imprisoned, and only regained his freedom after recognising a rare species he found in the prison, Necrobia ruficollis...
Histoire naturelle et iconographie des insectes coléoptères d'Europe Paris : Crevot, 1822. digitised at Gallica. - Spécies Général des Coléoptères (1825–1838)
External links
- Portrait and Short account of Dejean
- Internet Archive Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean Volume 1
- Internet Archive Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean Volume 2
- Internet Archive Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean Volume 3
- Internet Archive Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean Volume 4
- Internet Archive Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean Volume 5
- Internet Archive Catalogue des Coléoptères de la collection d’Auguste Dejean Volume 6