Matskási István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 94. (Budapest 2002)

Matskási, I.: Bicentenary of the Hungarian Natural History Museum

Nearly every specimen of the collection is type or original, and even more than that, certain specimens are double types (Unger and Ettingshausen). Our 19th century original and type material in itself includes almost 600 items. Thanks to these specimens, our collection is regarded as one of the highest ranking ones in Europe. With 20th century types and originals added prominent specimens amount to more than 1,000. As a result of Palatine JOSEPH'S generous purchase, the Hungarian LINNÉ's, PÁL KITAIBEL'S herbarium was received in as early as 1810, thanks to which the Department became highly prestigious. The acquisition of the SADLER collection, and Archbishop HAYNALD's vast herbarium followed thereafter, and then DEGEN'

s invaluable herbarium and the university collection of 'EÖTVÖS LORÁND' University of Arts and Sciences (ELTE), that were acquired at the beginning and at the end of the 20th century, respectively, enriched the herbarium by leaps and bounds. Besides, nearly all the significant botanical collections of the country found their way to our Department of Botany by way of purchase or donation, so the sheet number of the phanerogamous herbarium has exceeded 135,000 by now. Apart from the already mentioned palaeobotanic material, the phanerogamous herbarium is divided into two parts, a world material and one from the Carpathian Basin. As for the former, our collection of gymnosperms stands out with quite a few special species expeditions have collected from all over the world. We treat our lichen, moss, and fungus collections as separate ones in their own right because both their size and scientific value are imposing. A smaller collection is that of algae, mainly with sea algae among them, in a dried, herbarium-like state. In this latter respect JÓZSEF PANTOCSEK's siliceous alga collection is the finest. A whole array of great personalities worked for the Department of Botany, such as, e.g., Baron GÁBOR ANDREÁNSZKY who, after researching plant geography, participating in collecting expeditions and working as a professor, devoted himself to palaeobotany only. By exploring and collecting Tertiary flora in Hungary he was the one who greatly enhanced the material of the palaeobotanical collection and his significant monographs involved a valuable contribution to domestic literature. SÁNDOR JÁVORRA worked for the Department of Botany from 1905 until his death, together with VERA CSAPODY, his loyal plant sketcher. There is hardly anyone who has not heard about their book Erdő-mező virágai (The Flowers of Woods and Meadows), but plant identification handbooks and their major piece of work, Iconographia Florae Hungaricae are also the products of these years. The latter enormous volume depicts the species of the Carpathian Basin through images and with a perfect accuracy and fidelity, which makes it indispensable even for today's research botanists who wish to investigate the species of the Carpathian Basin. VERA CSAPODY prepared more than 11,500 water-colours