Athena Review Image Archive ™
Lamarck, Jean-Baptiste (1744-1829)
Portrait of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck at age 56 (Thévenin, 1802)
The French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, chevalier de Lamarck lived from August 1, 1744 to December 8, 1829. After serving as a soldier, he studied medicine and botany, and after publishing a three-volume work entitled Flore françoise (1778), he gained membership of the French Academy of Sciences in 1779. In 1793 he became professor of zoology in the Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle. In 1801, he published Système des animaux sans vertèbres, a major work on the classification of invertebrates, a term he coined.
Lamarck was a pioneer in evolutionary theory, contributing the major idea that biological evolution occurred in accordance with natural laws, with organisms increasing in complexity, and adapted to local environments through use and disuse of characteristics (Lamarck 1802). The mechanism of such evolutionary processes was later more thoroughly described by Darwin (1859) as the theory of natural selection.
This portrait of Lamarck by Charles Thévenin was painted in 1802, when he was 56. He is shown wearing a Napoleonic-era medal, in honor of his distinguished work as a naturalist.
References
Lamarck, Jean-Pierre 1802 Recherches sur l'Organisation des Corps Vivants.
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