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'''Johann Gerhard König''' (29 November 1728 – 26 June 1785) was a [[Baltic Germans|Baltic German]] [[botanist]] and [[physician]] who served in the [[Tranquebar Mission]], India before joining service under the Nawab of Arcot, and then the English East India Company. He collected natural history specimens including plants, particularly those of medical interest, from the region and several species are named after him including the [[curry tree]] ''(Murraya'' ''koenigii).''

== Biography ==
König was born near ''Kreutzburg'' in [[Inflanty Voivodeship|Polish Livonia]], which is now [[Krustpils]] in [[Latvia]].<ref>Various sources give his birthplace as Ungernhof (a.k.a. Lemenen), a manor belonging to the estate of Kreutzburg/Krustpils. Krustpils, which is on the north bank of the [[Daugava River|Daugava]], is now part of the city of [[Jēkabpils]], which was then ''Jakobstadt'' in [[Courland]] on the south bank. Rao (1998) places his birth in "Lenaenen in Courland (Denmark)" - that, however, being clearly erroneous</ref> He was a private pupil of [[Carl Linnaeus]] in 1757, and lived in [[Denmark]] from 1759 to 1767 during which time he examined the plants of Iceland. In 1767 he joined as a medical officer to the [[Tranquebar Mission]] and on his voyage to India, he passed through Cape Town where he met Governor [[Ryk Tulbagh|Rijk Tulbagh]] with an introduction from Linnaeus, collecting plants in the Table Mountain region from 1 to 28 April 1768. König replaced the position made available following the death of Halle-educated physician [[Samuel Benjamin Cnoll]] (1705–67).<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Jensen|first=Niklas Thode|date=2005-10-01|title=The Medical Skills of the Malabar Doctors in Tranquebar, India, as Recorded by Surgeon T L F Folly, 1798|url= |journal=Medical History|language=en|volume=49|issue=4|pages=489–515|doi=10.1017/S0025727300009170|issn=0025-7273|pmc=1251641|pmid=16562332}}</ref> In 1774 he took up a better paying position as [[natural history|naturalist]] for the [[Nawab of Arcot]], serving in that position until 1778.<ref>{{cite book | last=Rottbøll| first=Christen Friis | author-link= Christen Friis Rottbøll| year=1783 | title=Beskrivelse af nogle Planter fra de malabariske Kyster, Til Pisoniæ buxifoliæ Beskrivelse, som Side 537 endes, følger følgende Oplysning, som et nyelig med Skibet Tranquebar fra Ostindien af Hr. Dr. Kønig mig tilsendt Exemplar | language=Danish|trans-title=Description of some Plants from the Malabar Coasts ... | series= Proceedings of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters }}</ref><ref name="rao">Rao, B S Subba (1998) History of Entomology in India. Institution of Agricultural Technologists.</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/12795626|author=Hagen, H.A.|title=Bibliotheca entomologica. Die Litteratur über das ganze Gebiet der Entomologie, bis zum Jahre 1862. |volume=1|year=1862|page=428}}</ref> In 1773, he received the Doctor's degree ''[[graduation in absentia|in absentia]]'' from the [[University of Copenhagen]] possibly for his studies on indigenous remedies published as ''De remediorum indigenorum ad morbes cuivis regioni endemicos expuguandos efficacia''. He became naturalist to the Nawab of Arcot in 1774 and embarked on a trip to the mountains north of [[Madras]] and to [[Ceylon]], a description of which was later published in a Danish scientific journal. On 17 July 1778, König was appointed Naturalist at Madras with the [[British East India Company]] where he remained until his death, undertaking several scientific journeys and working with notable scientists like [[William Roxburgh]], [[Johan Christian Fabricius]] and Sir [[Joseph Banks]].

König followed the Moravian motto ''Unitas Fratrum'' meaning "United Brotherhood (or brethren)" to encourage botanical study among European missionaries in India and the initial members included [[Benjamin Heyne]], [[Johann Gottfried Klein]], [[Christoph Samuel John]] (1747–1813), and [[Johan Peter Rottler]]. Most plants collected by members of this group were sent back to Europe and described by [[Anders Jahan Retzius|A.J. Retzius]], [[Albrecht Wilhelm Roth|Roth]], [[Heinrich Schrader (botanist)|Schrader]], [[Carl Ludwig Willdenow|Willdenow]], [[Martin Vahl]] and [[James Edward Smith]].<ref>{{cite journal|author=Stewart, Ralph R.|year=1982|title=Missionaries and clergyen as botanists in India and Pakistan|url=https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/149715/tax02336.pdf|journal=Taxon|volume=31|issue=1|pages=57–64|doi=10.2307/1220590|jstor=1220590|hdl=2027.42/149715|hdl-access=free}}</ref> Only Rottler published his own descriptions.<ref>{{cite book|author=King, George|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/30383861|title=Report of the 69th meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science|year=1899|pages=904–919|chapter=A Sketch of the History of Indian Botany|volume=69}}</ref>

König made several visits around the region and perhaps the most notable of his journeys was to Siam and the Malacca Straits in 1778–80, in this period he spent several months studying the flora and fauna in [[Phuket]].<ref>{{cite journal|url= http://www.siamese-heritage.org/jsspdf/1904/JSS_002_2b_Gerini_HistoricalRetrospectOfJunkCeylonIslandPartI.pdf |title= Historical Retrospect of Junkceylon Island |author= Gerolamo Emilio Gerini |author-link= Gerolamo Emilio Gerini |journal= Journal of the Siam Society |year=1905 |pages= 32–41}}</ref> He met [[Patrick Russell (herpetologist)|Patrick Russell]] who arrived in India in 1782 at Tranquebar and the two remained in constant communication. He made trips to the hills near Vellore and Ambur and in 1776 a trip to the Nagori hills with George Campbell. In 1784, he visited Russell at Vizagapatnam on his way to Calcutta. On the way he suffered from dysentery and Roxburgh who was at Samalkota oversaw his treatment. He however did not recover and died at Jagannadhapuram, [[Kakinada]] in 1785. He bequeathed his papers to Sir [[Joseph Banks]].<ref name="rao" /><ref>{{Cite book|last=MacGregor|first=Arthur|url=https://brill.com/view/title/33597|title=Naturalists in the Field: Collecting, Recording and Preserving the Natural World from the Fifteenth to the Twenty-First Century|publisher=BRILL|year=2018|isbn=978-90-04-32384-1|pages=365–392|chapter=European Enlightenment in India: an Episode of Anglo-German Collaboration in the Natural Sciences on the Coromandel Coast, Late 1700s–Early 1800s|doi=10.1163/9789004323841_014}}</ref>

He described many plants used in [[Ayurveda|Indian Medicine]] and kept notes on other aspects of natural history including the termites of southern India and the collection and use of their alates as food.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/reportofproceedi41921ento| author=Fletcher, T.B.| chapter=Koenig's paper on South Indian termites|pages=[https://archive.org/details/reportofproceedi41921ento/page/312 312]-333|title=Proceedings of the Fourth Entomological Meeting|year=1921| publisher=Calcutta; Superintendent government printing, India}}</ref> Koenig's collections of insects from southern India may have been used in descriptions by [[Johan Christian Fabricius|Fabricius]].<ref>{{cite journal|author=Dover, Cedric|year=1922|title=Entomology in India|url=http://www.southasiaarchive.com/Content/sarf.120137/211237/014|journal=The Calcutta Review|volume=3|issue=2|pages=336–349}}</ref>

{{botanist|J.Koenig|Koenig, Johann Gerhard}}

The plant genus ''[[Koenigia]]'' was named for him by [[Carl Linnaeus|Linnaeus]], as was a species of curry-leaf tree ''[[Murraya koenigii]]''.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

=== Further reading ===

* {{cite journal |last1=Sterll |first1=M |title=Life and adventures of Johann Gerhard König (1728–1785), a phantom of the herbaria. |journal=Rheedea |date=2008 |volume=18 |pages=111–129}}

==External links==
* [http://linnaeus.nrm.se/botany/fbo/hand/koenig.html.en Linnean herbarium]
* [http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1251641 Tranquebar and its History]
* Biographies at [http://apps.kew.org/floraindica/htm/biography_koenig.htm Kew], the [http://www.nationaalherbarium.nl/FMCollectors/K/KoenigJG.htm Dutch Herbarium] and [http://www.s2a3.org.za/bio/Biograph_final.php?serial=1562 Biographical Database of Southern African Science]
{{S-start}}
{{Succession box
| title = Naturalist to the H.E.I.C. at [[Madras Presidency|Madras]]
| years = 1778-1785
| with =
| before = Position established in 1778
| after = [[Patrick Russell (herpetologist)|Patrick Russell]]
}}
{{S-end}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Konig, Johann Gerhard}}
[[Category:Botanists with author abbreviations]]
[[Category:1728 births]]
[[Category:1785 deaths]]
[[Category:Botanists active in India]]
[[Category:Baltic-German people]]

Johann Gerhard König - Revision history

->OAbot at 05:00, 4 October 2021