Acclimatisation Garden
Original title: Jardim de Aclimação
Describes the 1852 proposal by the Austrian botanist Frederico Welwitsch to create acclimatisation gardens in Luanda and Funchal, the Funchal one to serve as a subtropical intermediary for plants exchanged with Portugal's scientific gardens. The Funchal garden was never created.
On 23 September 1852 the Austrian botanist Friedrich Welwitsch proposed the creation of two acclimatisation gardens, one in São Paulo de Luanda (Luanda) and the other in Funchal. ‘The Funchal garden’, the botanist wrote, ‘would form a subtropical garden, receiving tropical plants already accustomed to a certain regular cultivation and naturalising them there, so that they could later be grown with better results in less hot climates; it would likewise accustom plants sent there from colder countries to grow at a higher temperature, thereby adapting them so that they would not find cultivation in regions of the tropical zone so strange... The scientific gardens of Lisbon, Coimbra and Porto would receive from the Funchal garden the tropical and subtropical plants acclimatised there, and would send it useful plants from colder countries to be acclimatised there.’
The Funchal acclimatisation garden was never created, despite the great advantages it would have brought not only to our island but also to Portugal and various foreign countries.
In this article
Time
Years mentioned · 01Place
Places mentioned · 05
Abroad
- Coimbra
Portugal. Its scientific garden was to exchange plants with the Funchal garden.
Portuguese mainland university city where many Madeirans studied law or medicine, and where Padre Luís Gonçalves da Câmara taught and was rector of the Jesuit college. It hosted the 1921 academic table-tennis championship, and its dormancy and rainfall data are compared with Funchal's.
- Funchal
Proposed site of a subtropical acclimatisation garden that was never created.
The capital of the archipelago and seat of the principal captaincy, where settlement began; it was made a vila c.1451–52. Its bay, the widest in the archipelago, lies between Ponta do Garajau and Ponta da Cruz and offers sheltered anchorage, though its harbour had never been studied oceanographically. The Elucidário discusses it as a health resort with climate data and records the January 1906 disturbances, the Danish prince's visit in May 1846 and recent volcanic cones in the area.
- Lisbon
Portugal. Its scientific garden was to exchange plants with the Funchal garden.
The Portuguese capital, seat of the Relação court and of the Misericórdia whose privileges and statutes were extended to Funchal. Henrique Franco de Sousa studied at its Royal Academy of Fine Arts, and Luiz José Baiardo moved there in 1821.
- Porto
Portugal. Its scientific garden was to exchange plants with the Funchal garden.
A Portuguese city, where the 1820 liberal revolution began and whose district is the only one denser than Funchal's. Several Madeirans studied at its medical school or Academia Politécnica, and some lived or died there. The editor of O Funchalense Liberal was hanged there, and Marítimo beat FC Porto there in 1922.
- São Paulo de Luanda
Angola. Proposed site of one of Welwitsch's two acclimatisation gardens.
Proposed site of one of Welwitsch's two acclimatisation gardens.
People
People mentioned · 01-
Austrian botanist who in 1852 proposed creating acclimatisation gardens in Luanda and Funchal.