Ignatz Urban

Who was Ignatz Urban?

Ignatz Urban was a German botanist. He is known for his contributions to the flora of the Caribbean and Brazil, and for his work as curator of the Berlin Botanical Garden. Born the son of a brewer, Urban showed an interest in botany as an undergraduate. He pursued further study at the University of Bonn and later at the University of Berlin where he gained a doctorate in 1873. Urban was appointed by A. W. Eichler to run the Berlin Botanical Garden and supervised its move to Dahlem. He also worked as Eichler's assistant on the Flora Brasiliensis, later succeeding him as editor. In 1884 Urban began working with Leopold Krug on his Puerto Rican collections, a collaboration would later produce the nine-volume Symbolae Antillanae, one of his most important contributions, and his 30-part Sertum Antillanum. Urban's herbarium, estimated to include 80,000 or more sheets, was destroyed when the Berlin Herbarium was bombed in 1943, during the Second World War.