Johann Wilhelm Meigen
Encyclopedia
Diptera
Diptera , or true flies, is the order of insects possessing only a single pair of wings on the mesothorax; the metathorax bears a pair of drumstick like structures called the halteres, the remnants of the hind wings. It is a large order, containing an estimated 240,000 species, although under half...
.
Early years
Meigen was born in SolingenSolingen
Solingen is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located on the northern edge of the region called Bergisches Land, south of the Ruhr area, and with a 2009 population of 161,366 is the second largest city in the Bergisches Land...
, the fifth of eight children of Johann Clemens Meigen and Sibylla Margaretha Bick. His parents, though not poor, were not wealthy either. The ran a small shop in Solingen. His paternal grandparents however owned an estate and hamlet with twenty houses. Adding to the rental income, Meigen’s grandfather was a farmer and a guild
Guild
A guild is an association of craftsmen in a particular trade. The earliest types of guild were formed as confraternities of workers. They were organized in a manner something between a trade union, a cartel, and a secret society...
mastercutler in Solingen.
Two years after Meigen was born his grandparents died and his parents moved to the family estate. This was already heavily indebted by the Seven Years' War
Seven Years' War
The Seven Years' War was a global military war between 1756 and 1763, involving most of the great powers of the time and affecting Europe, North America, Central America, the West African coast, India, and the Philippines...
, then bad crops and rash speculations forced sale and the family moved back to Solingen.
Meigen attended the town school but only for a short time. Fortunately he had learned to read and write on his grandfather’s estate and he read widely at home as well as taking an interest in natural history
Natural history
Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...
. A lodger in the household, a state surveyor named Stamm gave Meigen instruction in mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
. Another family friend a Reformed Church organist
Organist
An organist is a musician who plays any type of organ. An organist may play solo organ works, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers or instrumental soloists...
and teacher called Berger, gave him lessons from his 10th year on in piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
, orthography
Orthography
The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...
, and calligraphy
Calligraphy
Calligraphy is a type of visual art. It is often called the art of fancy lettering . A contemporary definition of calligraphic practice is "the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious and skillful manner"...
, Later on, in 1776, he also taught him French.
Meigen became Berger's assistant, going to Mülheim, with him. There he saw for the first time a systematic
Systematics
Biological systematics is the study of the diversification of terrestrial life, both past and present, and the relationships among living things through time. Relationships are visualized as evolutionary trees...
collection of butterflies, and here he also learnt how to collect and prepare insects.
In the Autumn of 1779 he returned to Solingen to help his parents, at first by giving private lessons in French, but in the following year he started a French school that lasted until early in 1784. During his few free hours in this period he studied history from Charles Rollin
Charles Rollin
Charles Rollin was a French historian and educator. He was born in Paris.-Biography:He was the son of a cutler, and at the age of twenty-two was made a master in the Collège du Plessis. In 1694 he was rector of the University of Paris, rendering great service among other things by reviving the...
's 15 volume Roman History and that author's 4 volume Ancient History (both in French). The
only entomological work in his possession at this time was Moder's (or Kleemann's) Caterpillar Calendar.
Later in 1784 he was recommended to Pelzer, a tradesman in Aachen, for the position of resident tutor. On taking up the post, he was treated as a family member. Pelzer had a cousin in Aachen by the name of Mathias Baumhauer, a wool merchant's son, who was a very able entomologist. Baumhauer had a butterfly collection including about 1200 species as well as numbers of insects of all other orders
Order (biology)
In scientific classification used in biology, the order is# a taxonomic rank used in the classification of organisms. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, family, genus, and species, with order fitting in between class and family...
.
Early entomology
Meigen’s first attempts to identify his collection which was mainly of DipteraDiptera
Diptera , or true flies, is the order of insects possessing only a single pair of wings on the mesothorax; the metathorax bears a pair of drumstick like structures called the halteres, the remnants of the hind wings. It is a large order, containing an estimated 240,000 species, although under half...
were made with a two volume work by Philipp Ludwig Statius Muller
Philipp Ludwig Statius Müller
Philipp Ludwig Statius Muller was a German zoologist.Statius Muller was born in Esens, and was Professor of Natural Science at Erlangen. Between 1773 and 1776, he published a German translation of Linnaeus's Natursystem...
a German translation of Linnaeus's Natursystem published in the Netherlands by Houttyn. He soon made his first discovery. The Linnean genera
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
were too inclusive and a better classification could be arrived at using wing venation
Insect wing
Insects are the only group of invertebrates known to have evolved flight. Insects possess some remarkable flight characteristics and abilities, still far superior to attempts by humans to replicate their capabilities. Even our understanding of the aerodynamics of flexible, flapping wings and how...
. This conclusion had already occurred to both Moses Harris
Moses Harris
Moses Harris was an English entomologist and engraver.In the Natural System of Colours he examined the work of Isaac Newton and tried to reveal the multitude of colours which can be created from three basic ones...
in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
and Louis Jurine
Louis Jurine
Louis Jurine was a Swiss physician, surgeon and naturalist mainly interested in entomology. He lived in Geneva.-Surgeon:Studies of surgery in Paris. Jurine quickly acquires a very great reputation of expert, well beyond Geneva...
in Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
but at the time Meigen was unaware of this. Sensing an important step forward he secured the works of Fabricius
Johan Christian Fabricius
Johan Christian Fabricius was a Danish zoologist, specialising in "Insecta", which at that time included all arthropods: insects, arachnids, crustaceans and others...
and from that time concentrated on Diptera.
He soon found that wing venation alone was not enough to classify the Dipera correctly and he began to make drawings of the antennae
Antenna (biology)
Antennae in biology have historically been paired appendages used for sensing in arthropods. More recently, the term has also been applied to cilium structures present in most cell types of eukaryotes....
viewed under a 20-power wooden-framed microscope
Microscope
A microscope is an instrument used to see objects that are too small for the naked eye. The science of investigating small objects using such an instrument is called microscopy...
purchased at the fair in Aachen, This, a lens of about 6-power, and his own very sharp eyesight and visual memory led him to the next important conclusion, that the Diptera could only be classified using character combinations; what is now known as an eclectic
Eclecticism
Eclecticism is a conceptual approach that does not hold rigidly to a single paradigm or set of assumptions, but instead draws upon multiple theories, styles, or ideas to gain complementary insights into a subject, or applies different theories in particular cases.It can sometimes seem inelegant or...
system..
Return to Solingen
In 1786 the Solingen organist, a younger brother of his former teacher Berger died in Solingen. That position, with a French school connected with it, was offered to Meigen and he went back to Solingen.There he became closely acquainted with a man called Weniger, who shared his interests in botany
Botany
Botany, plant science, or plant biology is a branch of biology that involves the scientific study of plant life. Traditionally, botany also included the study of fungi, algae and viruses...
and entomology. His enthusiasm for entomology and botany became broader and he decided to extend his studies to world species. Weniger felt likewise and they contacted the banker and collector Johann Christian Gerning
Johann Christian Gerning
Johann Christian Gerning was a German banker, art collector, and entomologist.Gerning lived in Frankfurt. His insect collection was given to Museum Wiesbaden in 1829 by his son Johann Isaak von Gerning. It is beautifully conserved and contains insects given to the Gerning family by Maria Sibylla...
in Frankfurt
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
. Gerning wrote to his son in the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, who bought insect specimens for him. A Swiss, Count von Meuron, who was in the Dutch service and whose brother was governor of Trincomalee
Trincomalee
Trincomalee is a port city in Eastern Province, Sri Lanka and lies on the east coast of the island, about 113 miles south of Jaffna. It has a population of approximately 100,000 . The city is built on a peninsula, which divides the inner and outer harbours. Overlooking the Kottiyar Bay,...
on Ceylon heard of their wishes and obtained for them the offer of positions as surgeons on an East Indiaman, with an additional stipend. This plan was given up when Meigen’s mother opposed it.
To Burtscheid
In 1792 Meigen took instruction in drawing. Then he was offered a teaching position in BurtscheidAachen (district)
The district of Aachen is a district in the west of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Neighboring districts are Heinsberg, Düren, Euskirchen, and also the Netherlands province of Limburg and the Belgian province of Liège.- History :...
near Aachen. However, he could not leave Solingen because the it was occupied by the French army during the Battle of Jemappes
Battle of Jemappes
The Battle of Jemappes took place near the town of Jemappes in Hainaut, Belgium, near Mons. General Charles François Dumouriez, in command of the French Revolutionary Army, defeated the greatly outnumbered Austrian army of Field Marshal Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen and his second-in-command...
. Only when the French withdrew after the Battle of Neerwinden
Battle of Neerwinden (1793)
The Battle of Neerwinden took place on near the village of Neerwinden in present-day Belgium between the Austrians under Prince Josias of Coburg and the French under General Dumouriez...
was he able to leave for Burtscheid and Aachen, where he then taught as well as collecting assiduously.
In 1796, Meigen took a job teaching French in Stolberg, 2 hours from Aachen. Here he remained without further change of residence until his death. In Stolberg outside of school hours he taught drawing
Drawing
Drawing is a form of visual art that makes use of any number of drawing instruments to mark a two-dimensional medium. Common instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, inked brushes, wax color pencils, crayons, charcoal, chalk, pastels, markers, styluses, and various metals .An artist who...
, geography
Geography
Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
, history
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
and piano. He also met a brass-worker named J. A. Peltzer, who was a mathematician and owned a 60-power Tiedemann achromatic telescope
Achromatic telescope
The achromatic telescope is a refracting telescope that uses an achromatic lens to correct for chromatic aberration.-How it works:When an image passes through a lens, the light is refracted at different angles for different wavelengths. This produces focal lengths that are dependent on the color of...
. Soon Meigen was teaching astronomy
Astronomy
Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...
as well.
In 1801 Meigen met the French naturalist Count Lacépède who had come to Stolberg to visit the brass works. They talked about natural history and Meigen showed Count Lacépède his drawings of Diptera. The following day Meigen was asked to visit Count Lacépède who asked him to join Capt. Baudin's voyage around the world as a botanist. Meigen declined.
In 1802 Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger
Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger
Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger was a German entomologist and zoologist.Illiger was the son of a merchant in Brunswick. He studied under the entomologist Johann Hellwig, and later worked on the zoological collections of Johann Centurius Hoffmannsegg...
who must have heard of Meigen from Count Lacépède and was at the baths in Aachen with Johann Centurius Hoffmannsegg
Johann Centurius Hoffmannsegg
Johann Centurius Hoffmann Graf von Hoffmannsegg was a German botanist, entomologist and ornithologist.Hoffmannsegg was born at Rammenau and studied at Leipzig and Göttingen. He travelled through Europe acquiring vast collections of plants and animals. He visited Hungary, Austria and Italy in...
invited him to join them. Meigen took his drawings along, and made arrangements with Illiger and Hoffmannsegg for future work. Illiger had captured a new and unknown Dipteron and showed a pen drawing of it to Meigen, asking him how it should be classified. Meigen described it as Eoxocera Hoffmannseggi. Illiger also agreed to proofread Meigen's first work on Diptera which was then published in 1804 by Reichard in Braunschweig.
Controversy
In 1804 the only classification of Diptera was that of FabriciusJohan Christian Fabricius
Johan Christian Fabricius was a Danish zoologist, specialising in "Insecta", which at that time included all arthropods: insects, arachnids, crustaceans and others...
. Despite Meigen’s more advanced, and more natural classification, Meigen's Die Fliegen found little favour with most entomologists, who were adherents of Fabricius, but that did not deflect Meigen.
In the same year Fabricius visited 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...
and saw Meigen’s work. On returning home, he wrote Meigen and arranged to meet him in Aachen. A few days later Fabricius came to Stolberg Here he was shown all of Meigen's new genera in order that he might use them in the projected new edition of Systema Antliatorum. Fabricius criticized Meigen for his eclectic method, asserting that a classification should be based upon one part of the body, (mainly mouthparts) not on several different parts. Meigen pointed out that Fabricius himself did not consistently follow his own precepts but even so Fabricius refused to use the eclectic method.
Marriage
In 1801 Meigen married Anna, the sister of the Reverend Mänsse, a preacher at Hückelhoven near LinnichLinnich
Linnich is a town in the district of Düren in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located on the river Rur, approx. 10 km north-west of Jülich.-Economy:Linnich is the home of SIG Combibloc the specialist for aseptic carton packaging....
. Anna was clearly devoted to Meigen which was as well since hard times were ahead. Until 1808 the number of students of French steadily declined, resulting of course in a considerable reduction in Meigen's income. In this crisis, a merchant in Stolberg, one Adolf Pelzer, obtained for him the secretaryship for the Stolberg commercial committee, including keeping minutes of meetings and carrying on correspondence in both German and French. Then, in another reversal, he was replaced by a voluntary secretariat.
Coal fossils
In 1812 the French government provided Meigen with the job of finishing drawings of coal fossilsCoal forest
Coal forests were the vast swathes of wetlands that extended over much of the tropical land areas during late Carboniferous and Permian times. These forests got their name because they accumulated enormous deposits of peat which later changed into coal...
. At this time his work day began usually at about 4 in the morning and lasted until late in the evening for 314 days of each year. All free time was spent with the study of entomology mostly Diptera, but also other orders. He also studied history and mathematics. At this time Meigen drew and coloured Many more species for Die Fliegen.
From 1812 to 1814 Meigen drew some maps for the municipality of Stolberg. He also corresponded again with Count von Hoffmannsegg, until the latter sold his collection to the Berlin Museum
Humboldt Museum
The Museum für Naturkunde, officially the ' or Naturkundemuseum , occasionally known as the Humboldt Museum, is a natural history museum in Berlin, Germany. Usually the museum's name is abbreviated MFN...
.
Offer from Wiedemann
In 1815, Meigen received a letter from State Attorney (Justizrat) Christian Rudolph Wilhelm WiedemannChristian Rudolph Wilhelm Wiedemann
Christian Rudolph Wilhelm Wiedemann , was a German physician, historian, naturalist and entomologist...
asking if there was any prospect that his work begun in 1804 could be continued. He offered access to the Fabricius collection in the University of Kiel
University of Kiel
The University of Kiel is a university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in 1665 as the Academia Holsatorum Chiloniensis by Christian Albert, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp and has approximately 23,000 students today...
. Then in the summer of 1816 Wiedemann came to Stolberg and stayed 8 days to outline an ambitious project. He had material sent to Meigen from the Vienna Museum, from the Hoffmannsegg collection in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, and from the Peter Simon Pallas
Peter Simon Pallas
Peter Simon Pallas was a German zoologist and botanist who worked in Russia.- Life and work :Pallas was born in Berlin, the son of Professor of Surgery Simon Pallas. He studied with private tutors and took an interest in natural history, later attending the University of Halle and the University...
collection. Meigen worked constantly and in 1818 the first volume of the new and enlarged edition of Die Fliegen came out, followed by the others until the 7th volume appeared in 1838. For this last volume Meigen had to make the lithographic plates himself to cut expenses. He also prepared 19 lithographic plates for Wiedemann's Aussereuropaische Zweiflugler. The first volumes of Die Fliegen were published by Meigen himself, but the costs were high, in spite of a considerable list of subscriptions. The Schulz bookdealers in Hamm took over the job with a sizeable honorarium.
In 1818, Meigen's longtime friend, the tireless collector, Baumhauer died in Paris. His widow brought his collection to Aachen and got Meigen to determine it. He took on the determination of at least 50,000 specimens from Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, France
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...
, the Pyrenees
Pyrenees
The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...
, the Alps
Alps
The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....
and northern Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
and worked on it for a year and a half. The collection was then sold for 1100 Dutch guilders, part of it going to Leiden and part to Luttich.
These years were very certainly hard. In 1816 and 1817 Because of poor harvests, food prices rose enormously. There were 7 children in his family at this time and his income was extremely low, there being now no demand for a French teacher, the French Empire
First French Empire
The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...
having collapsed. Eventually, through the fortunate intervention of the inspector of water supply, he got a well paid contract for some map-drawing lasting a couple of years. Astronomy also brought him some map-work.
He was able, however to make a trip to the Siebengebirge
Siebengebirge
The Siebengebirge is a German range of hills to the East of the Rhine, southeast of Bonn, consisting of more than 40 mountains and hills. It is located in the municipalities of Bad Honnef and Königswinter. It is of volcanic origin and came into being between 28 and 15 million years ago...
chiefly for botany and Meigen made some drawings of plants for Prof. Johann Georg Christian Lehmann
Johann Georg Christian Lehmann
Johann Georg Christian Lehmann was a German botanist.Born at Haselau, near Uetersen, Holstein, Lehmann studied medicine in Copenhagen and Göttingen, obtained a doctorate in medicine in 1813 and a doctorate in philosophy from he University of Jena in 1814...
a Hamburg botanist.
In 1821, Meigen made the acquaintance of Professor Heinrich Moritz Gaede
Heinrich Moritz Gaede
Heinrich Moritz Gaede, also Henri-Maurice Gaéde was a German naturalist and entomologist.He was a Professor in Lüttich and at the University of Liège....
of Luttich , whose name he gave to Trypeta gaedii and the tachinid genus Gaedia.
Wiedemann's second visit and a trip to Scandinavia
In 1822 Wiedemann made a second visit to Meigen, proposing that Meigen come to Kiel and revise the Fabrician collection,and offering to defray expenses. Meigen accepted, leaving for Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
on 23 June 1823. He was met in Hamburg
by the entomologist Wilhelm Von Winthem
Wilhelm von Winthem
Wilhelm von Winthem was a naturalist and entomologist from Hamburg, Germany, who was chiefly interested in Diptera and Hymenoptera. Well placed in a port city, von Winthem built a world collection....
, who invited him to stay at his home. Meigen, found himself in the house in which the great poet and dramatist Klopstock
Klopstock
Klopstock * Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock , a German poet** 9344 Klopstock , a Main-belt Asteroid discovered on 1991 by F. Borngen...
spent the last 30 years of his life and which Von Winthem's sister, Johanna Elisabeth von Winthem, Klopstock's widow, then owned. Here he studied the Winthem collection which contained so much that Meigen had to leave a more careful review of it for his return trip. He went on to Kiel
Kiel
Kiel is the capital and most populous city in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 238,049 .Kiel is approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the north of Germany, the southeast of the Jutland peninsula, and the southwestern shore of the...
to meet Wiedemann, He also met Heinrich Boie
Heinrich Boie
Heinrich Boie was a German zoologist. He was the brother of Friedrich Boie. In the field of herpetology they described 49 new species of reptiles and several new species of amphibians....
in Kiel. Next Meigen and Wiedemann went to Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
to visit Westermann
Bernt Wilhelm Westermann
Bernt Wilhelm Westermann was a wealthy Danish businessman who collected insects.An amateur insect collector Westermann travelled to Calcutta and later to Jakarta as an employee of an English business firm.At the Cape of Good Hope, in Bengal and Java he collected insects for English and Dutch...
and work on the Museum collection, postponing the main job on the Fabrician collection. Meigen was permitted to take all of the material away for examination. On 19 July, the two of them went to Lund
Lund
-Main sights:During the 12th and 13th centuries, when the town was the seat of the archbishop, many churches and monasteries were built. At its peak, Lund had 27 churches, but most of them were demolished as result of the Reformation in 1536. Several medieval buildings remain, including Lund...
, where both Prof. Carl Fredrik Fallén
Carl Fredrik Fallén
Carl Fredrik Fallén was a Swedish botanist and entomologist.Fallén taught at the Lund University. He wrote Diptera Sueciae .In 1817, Fallen discovered the Muscina stabulans species of flies....
and Johan Wilhelm Zetterstedt
Johan Wilhelm Zetterstedt
Johan Wilhelm Zetterstedt was a Swedish naturalist who worked mainly on Diptera and Hymenoptera.-Biography:Zetterstedt studied at the University of Lund, where he was a pupil of Anders Jahan Retzius. He received the title of professor in 1822 and succeeded Carl Adolph Agardh as professor of botany...
met them. Meigen examined Fallén's and Zetterstedt's collections at length.
On 23 July, Wiedemann and Meigen returned to Copenhagen, where Meigen stayed On 30 July they were back in Kiel, where everything in the collections of Fabricius and Westermann
Bernt Wilhelm Westermann
Bernt Wilhelm Westermann was a wealthy Danish businessman who collected insects.An amateur insect collector Westermann travelled to Calcutta and later to Jakarta as an employee of an English business firm.At the Cape of Good Hope, in Bengal and Java he collected insects for English and Dutch...
was carefully examined and compared and the unknown species drawn and described. After completing the research in Kiel, both left for Hamburg. There Meigen examined the Winthem collection, but there were so many new species in it that Winthem decided to send it all to Stolberg, where it could be worked on more conveniently. Also in Hamburg, Meigen met the entomologist Sommer from Altona and the botanist Johann Georg Christian Lehmann
Johann Georg Christian Lehmann
Johann Georg Christian Lehmann was a German botanist.Born at Haselau, near Uetersen, Holstein, Lehmann studied medicine in Copenhagen and Göttingen, obtained a doctorate in medicine in 1813 and a doctorate in philosophy from he University of Jena in 1814...
.
The trip to Denmark and Sweden lasted altogether 12 weeks, the result of which was a series of colored drawings of more than 400 species of insects, together with their descriptions and a large amount of corrections and notes. Studies of his collection of the Diptera in Fabricius
Johan Christian Fabricius
Johan Christian Fabricius was a Danish zoologist, specialising in "Insecta", which at that time included all arthropods: insects, arachnids, crustaceans and others...
' collection led to a very substantial revision.
Last years
Soon after 1822 The French school soon closed down completely and Meigen took the unpaid position of organist for his parish but he wrote a choral book, for which the church board paid him well. Meigen continued in this capacity until 1831.In 1825, Meigen made a translation of François Fénelon
François Fénelon
François de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon, more commonly known as François Fénelon , was a French Roman Catholic archbishop, theologian, poet and writer...
‘s Telemachus, and in the same year he was enabled to attend a meeting of naturalists in Berlin. Meigen's expenses were organised by Nees von Esenbeck, and many to whom he was known through his works on Diptera. He also saw there again Wiedemann. He took advantage of this occasion to examine the collection of the Berlin Museum
Humboldt Museum
The Museum für Naturkunde, officially the ' or Naturkundemuseum , occasionally known as the Humboldt Museum, is a natural history museum in Berlin, Germany. Usually the museum's name is abbreviated MFN...
and those of Ruthé
Johann Friedrich Ruthe
Johann Friedrich Ruthe Ruthé or von Ruthe was a German teacher and entomologist who specialised in Hymenoptera and Diptera.-Works:...
and Bouché
Peter Friedrich Bouché
Peter Friedrich Bouché was a German botanist and entomologist.His collection is in the German Entomological Institute-References:...
.
Von Winthem visited Meigen in 1826. Meigen also made a trip in that year to Crefeld and Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and centre of the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region.Düsseldorf is an important international business and financial centre and renowned for its fashion and trade fairs. Located centrally within the European Megalopolis, the...
. The following year, 1824, a Handbook for Butterfly Collectors appeared under his name, and he also started a much larger work on Lepidoptera. This latter appeared in fascicles, each of 10 quarto plates lithographed by Meigen himself. It went as far as
the Euphalaenae, where lack of funds brought it to a close. He coloured the plates in a few copies. The figures, except a very few borrowed from other works, were drawn by Meigen from specimens, many from the collection of an old friend Seeger.
After discontinuance of the work on Lepidoptera and the completion of that on Diptera with its 6th volume, Meigen had Diptera sent to him for determination from many sources. Outstanding among them were contributions from Joseph Waltl
Joseph Waltl
Dr. Joseph Waltl was a German physician and naturalist.Waltl was born in Wasserburg and studied at Landshut and Munich, graduating in medicine in 1819. He then travelled in Austria, France and Spain...
and Heinrich Georg Bronn
Heinrich Georg Bronn
Heinrich Georg Bronn was a German geologist and paleontologist.Bronn was born at Ziegelhausen near Heidelberg. Studying at the university of Heidelberg he took his doctor's degree in the faculty of medicine in 1821, and in the following year was appointed professor of natural history...
, These induced him to work up a supplementary volume, which was notable for the division of the genera Tachina, Musca and Anthomyia into a number of genera
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
based upon more critical characters than those used previous French and English workers.
At the same time Meigen worked industriously, on a Flora of Germany, which was not completed until a few years before his death. The last volume of this work, also containing numerous drawings made largely from nature by Meigen himself,
appeared in 1842. It was his last work.
When the French dipterologist Jean Macquart
Justin Pierre Marie Macquart
Justin Pierre Marie Macquart was a French entomologist specialising in the study of Diptera. He worked on world species as well as European and described many new species.-Early years:...
visited him in 1839 to see his collection, Meigen also showed him 2 thick quarto volumes of drawings containing 300 plates of colored and mostly enlarged drawings of all the species that had described. Macquart told Meigen that he would like to buy them, quoting a price of 1800 francs on behalf of the Jardin des Plantes
Jardin des Plantes
The Jardin des Plantes is the main botanical garden in France. It is one of seven departments of the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle. It is situated in the 5ème arrondissement, Paris, on the left bank of the river Seine and covers 28 hectares .- Garden plan :The grounds of the Jardin des...
in Paris. He paid an additional 1200 francs for Meigen's collection of Diptera, which also went to Paris.
Meigen then disposed of his library and the remainder of his collection. His books and fruit and plant collection were bought by the Verein für narturliche Wissenschaften und Gewerbe (Society for useful sciences and industry) in Aachen,
All of his insects other than Diptera were bought by Arnold Foerster, along with a few manuscripts including colored drawings of Hymenoptera.
In 1839, the Crown-Prince of Prussia awarded Meigen with a pension of 200 thalers a year.
On 3 May 1845 Meigen was presented with a doctor's diploma from the University of Bonn
University of Bonn
The University of Bonn is a public research university located in Bonn, Germany. Founded in its present form in 1818, as the linear successor of earlier academic institutions, the University of Bonn is today one of the leading universities in Germany. The University of Bonn offers a large number...
.
Meigen died in Stolberg near Aachen (=Aix-la-Chapelle), on 11 July 1845 at the age of 83.
Achievements
Meigen is universally recognized as the "father" of DipterologyDiptera
Diptera , or true flies, is the order of insects possessing only a single pair of wings on the mesothorax; the metathorax bears a pair of drumstick like structures called the halteres, the remnants of the hind wings. It is a large order, containing an estimated 240,000 species, although under half...
. Aside from his beautifully executed drawings Meigen's great achievement was to employ combinations of morphological characters to work out his scientific classification. This was in contrast to his Swedish
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
contemporary Carl Frederick Fallén who had used mouthpart characters alone. Thus he had come to the same conclusion as Pierre André Latreille
Pierre André Latreille
Pierre 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...
, Moses Harris
Moses Harris
Moses Harris was an English entomologist and engraver.In the Natural System of Colours he examined the work of Isaac Newton and tried to reveal the multitude of colours which can be created from three basic ones...
and Louis Jurine
Louis Jurine
Louis Jurine was a Swiss physician, surgeon and naturalist mainly interested in entomology. He lived in Geneva.-Surgeon:Studies of surgery in Paris. Jurine quickly acquires a very great reputation of expert, well beyond Geneva...
though independently and an eclectic methodology was firmly established.
Meigen described a vast number of Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an Diptera (mostly valid) and his work laid the foundations of all later work on this important insect group.
Flies described by Meigen (not complete)
- Asilus rufibarbis an asilidAsilidaeInsects in the Diptera family Asilidae are commonly called robber flies. The family Asilidae contains about 7,100 described species worldwide....
http://www3.kcn.ne.jp/~tgw/m-index2-e.htm - the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogasterDrosophila melanogasterDrosophila melanogaster is a species of Diptera, or the order of flies, in the family Drosophilidae. The species is known generally as the common fruit fly or vinegar fly. Starting from Charles W...
, which is a model organism in the study of geneticsGeneticsGenetics , a discipline of biology, is the science of genes, heredity, and variation in living organisms....
. - the Muscina pascuorum species of flies.
Works
Diptera- Meigen, J. W., 1804., Klassifikazion und Beschreibung der europäischen zweiflügeligen Insekten Part 1 , in English, Systematic description of the known European two-winged insects. Reichard, Braunschweig [= Brunswick] (5 November)
- Meigen, J. W., 1820, Systematische Beschreibung der bekannten europäischen zweiflügeligenInsektenPart 2 F.W. Forstmann, Aachen.(before December).
Lepidoptera
- Systematische Beschreibung der Europäischen Schmetterlinge Aachen ; Leipzig, [1827]-1829-32.
Collections
Most of the Meigen collection is in the Muséum National d'Histoire NaturelleMuséum national d'histoire naturelle
The Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle is the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, France.- History :The museum was formally founded on 10 June 1793, during the French Revolution...
, Paris. There are other specimens, including types in the Natural History Museum of Vienna.
External links
- Wikisite in German. Portrait.
- Biography by J. A. Förster
- „Systematische Beschreibung der bekannten europäischen zweiflügeligen Insekten“, Bd. 6, 1830 (PDF)
- „Systematische Beschreibung der bekannten europäischen zweiflügeligen Insekten“, Bd. 7, 1838 (PDF)
- EOL Encyclopedia of LifeEncyclopedia of LifeThe Encyclopedia of Life is a free, online collaborative encyclopedia intended to document all of the 1.9 million living species known to science. It is compiled from existing databases and from contributions by experts and non-experts throughout the world...
Taxa described by Johann Wilhelm Meigen.Sometimes has very detailed links to older literature. - Systema Dipterorum Nomenclator Full list of Diptera taxa described by Johann Wilhelm Meigen
Sources and references
- J.A. Förster (1974). On the life and influence of J.W. Meigen, Mosquito Systematics, 6 (2) : 79-88.
- Morge, G.Günter MorgeGünter Morge was a German entomologist who specialised in Diptera.For most of his career Morge worked at the Institut fur Pflanzenschutzforschung in Berlin mostly on Acalyptrate Diptera.He was also, sometime, curator of the large Diptera collections at Admont Abbey.-Works:Partial list*1967 Die...
1975. Dipteren Farbtafeln nach den bisher nicht veroofentlichen Original Handzeichnungen Meigens. Tafel 1-80. Beitrage zur Entomologie 25: 383-500. - Morge, G. 1976 Dipteren Farbtafeln nach den bisher nicht veroofentlichen Original Handzeichnungen Meigens. Tafel 81-160. Beitrage zur Entomologie 26: 441.
- Morge, G. 1976b. Dipteren Farbtafeln nach den bisher nicht veroofentlichen Original Handzeichnungen Meigens. Tafel 161-305. Beitrage zur Entomologie 26: 543.