Johann Bauhin

Who was Johann Bauhin?

Johann Bauhin was a Swiss botanist, born in Basel. He was the son of physician Jean Bauhin and the brother of physician and botanist Gaspard Bauhin.

He studied botany at Tübingen under Leonhart Fuchs. He then travelled with Conrad Gessner, after which he started a practise of medicine at Basel, where he was elected Professor of Rhetoric in 1566. Four years later he was invited to become physician to Duke Frederick I of Württemberg at Montbéliard, where he remained until his death. He devoted himself chiefly to botany. His great work, Historia plantarum universalis, a compilation of all that was then known about botany, was incomplete at his death, but was published at Yverdon in 1650–1651.

Bauhin nurtured several botanic gardens and also collected plants during his travels. In 1591, he published a list of plants named after saints called De Plantis a Divis Sanctisve Nomen Habentibus.

He died in Montbéliard.

Carolus Linnaeus named the genus Bauhinia for the brothers Johann and Gaspard Bauhin.