Editing Botany (section)

=== Early modern botany ===
{{Further|Taxonomy (biology)#History of taxonomy}}
[[File:CarlvonLinne Garden.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Photograph of a garden|The [[Linnaean Garden]] of Linnaeus' residence in Uppsala, Sweden, was planted according to his ''Systema sexuale''.]]

During the 18th century, systems of [[plant identification]] were developed comparable to [[single access key|dichotomous keys]], where unidentified plants are placed into [[taxon]]omic groups (e.g. family, genus and species) by making a series of choices between pairs of [[Character (biology)|characters]]. The choice and sequence of the characters may be artificial in keys designed purely for identification ([[single access key#Diagnostic ('artificial') versus synoptic ('natural') keys|diagnostic keys]]) or more closely related to the natural or [[taxonomic order|phyletic order]] of the [[taxon|taxa]] in synoptic keys.{{sfn|Scharf|2009|pp = 73–117}} By the 18th century, new plants for study were arriving in Europe in increasing numbers from newly discovered countries and the European colonies worldwide. In 1753, [[Carl Linnaeus]] published his [[Species Plantarum]], a hierarchical classification of plant species that remains the reference point for [[International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants|modern botanical nomenclature]]. This established a standardised binomial or two-part naming scheme where the first name represented the [[genus]] and the second identified the [[species]] within the genus.{{sfn|Capon|2005|pp = 220–223}} For the purposes of identification, Linnaeus's ''Systema Sexuale'' [[Linnaean taxonomy#Classification of plants|classified]] plants into 24 groups according to the number of their male sexual organs. The 24th group, ''Cryptogamia'', included all plants with concealed reproductive parts, [[moss]]es, [[liverwort]]s, [[fern]]s, [[algae]] and [[Fungus|fungi]].{{sfn|Hoek|Mann|Jahns|2005|p = 9}}

Increasing knowledge of [[plant anatomy]], [[plant morphology|morphology]] and life cycles led to the realisation that there were more natural affinities between plants than the artificial sexual system of Linnaeus. [[Michel Adanson|Adanson]] (1763), [[Antoine Laurent de Jussieu|de Jussieu]] (1789), and [[Augustin Pyramus de Candolle|Candolle]] (1819) all proposed various alternative natural systems of classification that grouped plants using a wider range of shared characters and were widely followed. The [[Candollean system]] reflected his ideas of the progression of morphological complexity and the later [[Bentham & Hooker system]], which was influential until the mid-19th century, was influenced by Candolle's approach. [[Charles Darwin|Darwin]]'s publication of the ''[[On the Origin of Species|Origin of Species]]'' in 1859 and his concept of common descent required modifications to the Candollean system to reflect evolutionary relationships as distinct from mere morphological similarity.{{sfn|Starr|2009|pp =299–}}

In the 19th century botany was a socially acceptable hobby for upper-class women. These women would collect and paint flowers and plants from around the world with scientific accuracy. The paintings were used to record many species that could not be transported or maintained in other environments. [[Marianne North]] illustrated over 900 species in extreme detail with watercolor and oil paintings.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Ross |first=Ailsa |date=2015-04-22 |title=The Victorian Gentlewoman Who Documented 900 Plant Species |url=http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/marianne-north-early-female-explorer |access-date=2024-06-05 |website=Atlas Obscura |language=en}}</ref> Her work and many other women's botany work was the beginning of popularizing botany to a wider audience.

Botany was greatly stimulated by the appearance of the first "modern" textbook, [[Matthias Jakob Schleiden|Matthias Schleiden]]'s ''{{lang|de|Grundzüge der Wissenschaftlichen Botanik}}'', published in English in 1849 as ''Principles of Scientific Botany''.{{sfn|Morton|1981|p = 377}} Schleiden was a microscopist and an early plant anatomist who co-founded the [[cell theory]] with [[Theodor Schwann]] and [[Rudolf Virchow]] and was among the first to grasp the significance of the [[cell nucleus]] that had been described by [[Robert Brown (botanist, born 1773)|Robert Brown]] in 1831.{{sfn|Harris|2000|pp = 76–81}} In 1855, [[Adolf Fick]] formulated [[Fick's laws of diffusion|Fick's laws]] that enabled the calculation of the rates of [[molecular diffusion]] in biological systems.{{sfn|Small|2012|pp =118–}}

[[File:Echeveria glauca II.jpg|thumb|''Echeveria glauca'' in a Connecticut greenhouse. Botany uses Latin names for identification; here, the specific name ''glauca'' means blue.]]