Christen Friis Rottbøll

Who was Christen Friis Rottbøll?

Christen Friis Rottbøll was a Danish physician and botanist and pupil of Carolus Linnaeus.

He studied at the University of Copenhagen, first theology, then medicine, in which in took his doctorate degree in 1755. He then travelled abroad 1757-1761 to further his studies of medicine, and to study chemistry and botany - the latter subject at Uppsala University with Linnaeus. From 1761, he was executive at the Botanic Garden in Copenhagen, and succeeded Georg Christian Oeder as its director i 1770. He was appointed professor at the Chair of Medicine in 1776 and received the title of "royal adviser" in 1784.

As a medical doctor, he studied smallpox and reformed the vaccination programme that had run in Copenhagen since 1755. He abolished pre and post treatment and instead advised systematic weakening of the inoculum before application.

As a botanist, Rottbøll gave out the first comprehensive list of the Flora of Greenland, he published descriptions of plants from the Danish colonies in India collected by Johann Gerhard König, and similarly of plants from Suriname collected by Daniel Rolander.