Henri Louis Frédéric de Saussure

Who was Henri Louis Frédéric de Saussure?

Henri Louis Frédéric de Saussure, was a Swiss mineralogist and entomologist specialising in studies of Hymenoptera and Orthoptera. He also was a prolific taxonomist.

His elementary education was at Alphonse Briquet's then, at as an adolescent, at the Hofwyl school run by Philipp Emanuel von Fellenberg. At the University of Geneva he was taught by François Jules Pictet de la Rive, who introduced him to entomology. After several years of study in Paris he received the degree of licenciate of the Faculty of Paris and obtained the degree of Doctor from the University of Giessen.

He worked mainly on Hymenoptera and Orthoptera. His first paper, in 1852, was on solitary wasps.

In 1854 he travelled to the West Indies, then to Mexico and the United States of America. There he met Louis Agassiz.

He returned to Switzerland in 1856 with collections of American insects, myriapods, crustaceans, birds and mammals. Also interested in geography, geology and ethnology he co-founded the Geographical Society of Geneva in 1858.