Conrad Gessner

Timeline

1. 1516–1537Zurich · Canton of ZurichGessner was born in Zürich near Zurich, orphaned of his father in childhood and raised by an uncle. He studied in Zurich, Strasbourg, Bourges, and elsewhere, mastering Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; he received his bachelor's degree in 1537, showing outstanding talent for languages and the organization of texts.
2. 1537–1551Zurich · Canton of ZurichFrom 1541 he taught at the Carolinum in Zurich while broadly collecting plant and animal specimens and fossils. He built a private natural history collection and compiled the Bibliotheca Universalis, accumulating material and methods for the grand project of Historia Animalium.
3. 1551–1560Zurich · Canton of ZurichThe five volumes of Historia Animalium appeared successively from 1551 to 1558, and 1551–1560 was the core period of Gessner's scholarly career. Synthesizing classical texts, travel accounts, and personal observation, he described mammals, birds, fish, and more with fine woodcut illustrations; though mixed with mythical creatures, it pioneered modern zoological classification and description.
4. 1560–1565Zurich · Canton of ZurichIn the 1560s Gessner continued compiling botanical works and bibliographic indexes and studied fossils and minerals. During the plague in Zurich in 1565 he insisted on making house calls and died of the infection in December, aged only forty-nine, leaving many unfinished manuscripts and natural history collections.