Johann Gerhard König (29 November 1728 – 26 June 1785) was a botanist and physician born in 1728 in Ungerhof,^[1] in Polish Livland. He was a private pupil of Carolus Linnaeus in 1757, and lived in Denmark from 1759 to 1767. From 1773 to 1785, he worked as a naturalist for the Nawab of Arcot in India. He was in Tranquebar with the Danish medical mission from 1773 to 1785.^[2]

In 1773, he received the Doctor's degree in absentia from the University of Copenhagen. As naturalist to the Nawab of Arcot he embarked on a voyage to the mountains north of Madras and to Ceylon, a description of which was later published in a Danish scientific journal. In 1778, König was transferred to a post with the British East India Company where he remained until his death, undertaking several scientific journeys and working with notable scientists like William Roxburgh, Johann Christian Fabricius and Sir Joseph Banks. Perhaps the most notable of those journeys was to Thailand and the Malacca Straits in 1778-80. He met Patrick Russell who arrived in India in 1782 at Tranquebar and remained in constant communication.

He made trips to the hills near Vellore and Ambur and in 1776 he made a trip to the Nagori hills with George Campbell. In 1784 he visited Claud Russell at Vizagapatnam on his way to Calcutta. On the way he suffered from dysentery and Roxburgh who was at Samalkot visited him. He however did not recover and died in Jagrenatporum (now Orissa) in 1785. He bequeathed his papers to Sir Joseph Banks.^[2]

He described many plants used in Indian Medicine. The Curry-leaf tree Murraya koenigii is named after him. This botanist is denoted by the author abbreviation J.Koenig when citing a botanical name.^[3]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Linnean herbarium
• Tranquebar and its History

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