The archives of the Herbarium Martii

The Herbarium Martii (ca. 300,000 specimens) iss one of the largest private herbaria assembled in the nineteenth century. It covered the entire world, but focused on the flora of Brazil (one third of the specimens), Martius being the editor of the series Flora Brasiliensis (Taxonomic Literature entry 5538). It was acquired by the Belgian government in 1870, two years after Martius' death and formed the beginning of the herbarium of the new Jardin botanique de l'Etat (Brussels) in 1871.

The documentation kept in connection with the Herbarium Martii also belonged to the acquisition. Its main elements are:
 

• a bound Elenchus Collectionum Botanicarum in Herbario Martii asservatarum

('Catalogue of Botanical Collections held in the Herbarium Martii'), enumerating and shortly describing the 568 acquisitions of the herbarium;

• the Accessionum Catalogi, lists informing about the individual acquisitions; most of these were rediscovered in BR in October 1999.

page sample of the Elenchus

example of the cover of the catalog of acquisitions 340 & 350

example of a page from the catalogue 340

In construction: a searchable database of the archives of the Herbarium Martii.