Michel Adanson

The standard author abbreviation Adans. is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name. Adanson was born at Aix-en-Provence. His family moved to Paris in 1730. After leaving the Collège Sainte-Barbe, he was employed in the cabinets of R. A. F. Réaumur and Bernard de Jussieu, as well as in the Jardin des Plantes, Paris. He attended lectures at the Jardin du Roi and the Collège Royal in Paris from 1741 to 1746. At the end of 1748, funded by a director of the Compagnie des Indes, he left France on an exploring expedition to Senegal. He remained there for five years, collecting and describing numerous animals and plants. He also collected specimens of every object of commerce, delineated maps of the country, made systematic meteorological and astronomical observations, and prepared grammars and dictionaries of the languages spoken on the banks of the Sénégal.