Herbariums / Herbários

The Madeiran herbariums are not rare in Europe, due to the large number of botanical explorations carried out here in the 18th and 19th centuries, mainly by foreign naturalists. The collections of R. T. Lowe are housed in the British Museum and at Kew Gardens, which also possess the herbariums of Banks, Dr. Solander, Francisco Masson, and Downe. The British Museum also holds the valuable herbarium of our late compatriot João Maria Moniz and part of Dr. Carlos Lemann's. At the University of Cambridge, there are numerous specimens collected by the latter naturalist in Madeira, and at the aforementioned Kew Gardens, there are many specimens from the collections of the French botanist Mandon, who traveled through the archipelago in 1865 and 1866.

It is assumed that the Madeiran herbarium that belonged to Dr. Heer is in the Zurich Botanical Garden, as many of his botanical collections were deposited there, and that Forster's herbarium is in the University of Kiel or in the Museum of Natural History in Paris, where, according to Alphonse De Candolle, the botanical collections obtained on Cook's second voyage around the world were sent.

In the herbariums of Franqueville and Cosson in France, those of Boissier, Candolle, and Delessert in Switzerland, and in the Palatine Museum in Vienna, there are many specimens of Madeiran plants collected by Mandon. The Botanical Museum of Florence houses many of the collections organized by the English botanist Webb on this island in 1828. The herbariums of M. Gandoger and O. Debeaux in France contain rich collections from this island, offered by one of the authors of this Elucidario, and in the Universities of Coimbra, Lisbon, and Porto, numerous dried plants from our region can be seen, sent by the same collector, who also sent complete collections of the Ranunculaceae, Onoteraceae, and Ciperaceae of Madeira to the former International Academy of Botanical Geography of Mans, as well as collections of indigenous ferns to the same Academy and to Prince Bonaparte, a distinguished French pteridologist.

We do not know the fate of the collections of Holl, Lippold, Schacht, and Captain Norman; as for those of Bornmuller, Trelease, and Dr. Vahl, everything leads us to believe that they are in the possession of their organizers. Many of the plants collected by Nathaniel Mason in Madeira are in the aforementioned Palatine Museum, while the collections of the distinguished Portuguese botanist Barão de Castelo de Paiva were offered by him to the Academy of Sciences of Lisbon, passing from there to the Faculty of Sciences of the same city.

James Y. Johnson organized a small herbarium of Madeiran plants, which is deposited in the Museum of the Seminary of Funchal. This collection, despite being quite incomplete, is notable for containing most of the rare species on the island. The last time we saw it (1921), it was in good condition, due to the care taken to subject it from time to time to carbon disulfide vapors.

Thanks to the botanical collections of the young Madeiran botanist José Gonçalves da Costa, a 3rd-year theology student at the Episcopal Seminary of Funchal, the herbarium of the same seminary is now (1921) one of the richest known in plants from the Madeira archipelago. Mr. Costa's botanical collections have been made especially in Funchal, Porto do Moniz, Achadas da Cruz, Ribeira da Janela, and Porto Santo, resulting in very valuable elements, including some new species and varieties.

We have referred to collections of Phanerogamic and Vascular Cryptogamic; as for collections of Cellular Cryptogamic, the most valuable ones organized to date are, we believe, those of Kny, Johnson, Mandon, Winter, Miss Armitage, Castelo de Paiva, Bornmuller, and Father J. Barreto, the first five of Muscineas and the remaining ones of Madeiran Lichens. The Reverend Father Jaime Barreto made abundant collections of Madeiran Fungi years ago, and Dr. Liebetruth, Captain Albertis, Reverend E. Schmitz, and Dr. Gain collected the marine Algae of the archipelago. Dr. Lindman collected the freshwater algae of Madeira, and one of the authors of this Elucidario did the same, with his specimens being largely determined by the Reverends Zimmermann, a Swiss botanist, and Schodduyn, a French botanist.

The Museum of the Seminary of Funchal also possesses, in addition to Johnson's herbarium, which we have already mentioned, the excellent collection of Lichens that belonged to this same botanist, the collections of Lichens and Fungi of Reverend Father Jaime Barreto, and the marine algae of Reverend Father Ernesto Schmitz. There is also a notebook with Lichens collected many years ago on this island by the late Madeiran naturalist João Maria Moniz, as well as other materials of lesser value.

The botanical collections existing in the Seminary are the only ones that can guide the foreign naturalist visiting Madeira in the study of the indigenous flora, as neither the government nor the administrative bodies have yet thought of creating a regional museum to receive the productions of the three kingdoms, which are very varied and interesting in many parts of the archipelago.

See Natural History Cabinet and Museums.