orchids and orchidology in central america. 500 ... - lankesteriana.org

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The Belgian Auguste Boniface Ghiesbreght (1819-
1893) and the Luxembourgian Nicholas Funck (1816-
1896) explored Mexico (especially the states Tabasco
and Chiapas) together with Linden. While Funck later
joined Linden in his third expedition to South America,
Ghiesbreght returned to Mexico in 1840, where
he formed important collections. “He introduced
many fine plants to the nurseries of Van Houtten and
Verschaffelt” (Anonymous, 1893: 634). Ghiesbreght
had been hired as the zoologist of the expedition, and
in 1842 sold insects to the Paris Museum, for 30 francs
per hundred specimens (Papavero & Ibáñez-Barnal,
2001: 83). During the years of 1850-1855 he made
his third voyage to Mexico and his second to Chiapas,
forgetting the dangers he had encountered before and
which had almost cost him his life. He died in Mexico,
at San Cristóbal de las Casas, in February of 1893
(Anonymous, 1893: 634). Ghiesbreght was perhaps
the botanist with the greatest knowledge of the flora of
northern Mesoamerica during the first half of the XIX
century. Although his collections were primarily of
plants from other families, he discovered an important
number of new species of Orchidaceae that were
described by Richard and Galeotti in the Annales des
sciences naturelles, a journal whose publication had
begun some years earlier in Paris, edited by Adolphe
Théodore Brongniart. Ghiesbreght would become
Linden’s lifelong friend and collaborator. “Captivated
by the novelties of a tropical flora, his earliest and latest
field of research, and apparently his favorite one, was
the south-eastern-most part of Mexico, comprising the
states of Tabasco and Chiapas” (Anonymous, 1889:
585).
Funck (Fig. 32A), who was Linden’s favorite
illustrator, also made important contributions to the
knowledge of the orchids of Central America. “He is
[...] inextricably linked with the life of Jean Linden. [...]
His name is also to be found amongst the administrators
of the Linden companies [...] The friendship between
the two men was further strengthened when Funck
and Linden married two Luxembourg sisters,
Catherine and Anna Reuter, on 9 April 1849 and 13
October 1845 respectively” (Ceulemans et al., 2006:
27). Among the types collected by Ghiesbreght
and Funck, or dedicated to them, are the following:
Brachystele sarcoglossa (A. Rich. & Gal.) Burns-
Bal. (Ghiesbreght s.n.), Calanthe calanthoides (A.
LANKESTERIANA
LANKESTERIANA 9(1—2), August 2009. © Universidad de Costa Rica, 2009.
Rich. & Gal.) Hamer & Garay (Ghiesbreght s.n.) (Fig.
32B), Encyclia ghiesbreghtiana (A. Rich. & Gal.)
Dressler (Ghiesbreght 6, Oncidium ghiesbreghtianum
A. Rich. & Gal. (Ghiesbreght W 27024), Spiranthes
cinnabarinus Hemsl. (Ghiesbreght s.n.), Epidendrum
funckianum A. Rich. & Gal. (Funck s.n.), and Pelexia
funckiana (A. Rich. & Galeotti) Schltr. (H. Galeotti
5171). Richard and Galeotti dedicated the genus
Ghiesbreghtia and Schlechter the genus Funckiella to
these two great Belgian botanists.
The German Friedrich Ernst Leibold (1804-1864)
arrived in Mexico in 1839. As one of many guests
of Sartorius, he collected mainly in Zacuapán, in the
neighborhood of El Mirador. Reichenbach named after
him Leochilus leiboldi and Hemsley mentions many of
his collections, such as: Epidendrum seriatum Lindl.,
Sobralia macrantha Lindl., Govenia mutica Rchb. f.,
Maxillaria pumila Hook. and the types of Brassavola
(=Homalopetalum) pumilio Rchb. f. and Lepanthes
pristidis Rchb. f. Reichenbach described many of the
species collected by Leibold in Klotzsch’s “Beiträge
zu einer Aequinoctialflora Amerika’s”(1849).
Emmanuel Ritter von Friedrichsthal (1809-1842)
was born in Bohemia and in 1839 traveled through
Nicaragua and Costa Rica, continuing to Panama,
Guatemala and Yucatán. “He disembarked in San
Juan del Norte, in Nicaragua, at the beginning of
1839, having been before in the Antilles, and after
exploring the Pacific coast of the other Central
American countries, arrived in Costa Rica, possibly
via Puntarenas” (León, 2002: 132). Friedrichsthal drew
maps, took barometric measurements, investigated the
conditions of the natural history and ethnography and
sent reports to his government about the technology,
industry and commerce of the countries he visited
(Wurzbach, 1858: 360). “He botanized extensively
in Costa Rica between 1839 and 1842, along the Río
San Juan and from Guanacaste to Cartago” (Grayum
et al, 2004: 2). However, all of his collections at Kew
are labeled ‘Guatemala’. Friedrichsthal, like many
others before him, applied the name Guatemala to
Central America as a whole, probably keeping with
the customs of colonial times of calling the region
‘Captaincy General of Guatemala’ or ‘Kingdom of
Guatemala’. The confusion is clear in the description
of one of the new species of Orchidaceae known from
Friedrichsthal’s collections: Maxillaria friedrichsthallii