Carolus Clusius

Carolus Clusius (born February 19, 1526, Arras, France—died April 4, 1609, Leiden, Netherlands) was a Renaissance botanist who contributed to the establishment of modern botany in the 16th century. He was best known by the Latin version of his name, Carolus Clusius, rather than his French name, Charles de l’Escluse. He experimented with the cultivation of exotic plants, such as the tulip, potato, and chestnut, that were introduced to Europe from other parts of the world. Clusius also translated seminal works in botany and described hundreds of plants in his own writings.

Education and early life

Clusius was born in an aristocratic family, and his father was a councillor at the provincial court of Artois. Clusius attended several European institutions, such as Collegium Trilingue in Louvain, the University of Wittenberg, and the University of Montpellier. He trained in languages, law, medicine, and botany. He studied under the French naturalist and physician Guillaume Rondelet and organized the latter’s extensive notes on aquatic life into Rondelet’s book, Libri de Piscibus Marinis (1554–55; “Book of Marine Fish”).

Clusius also translated the Flemish botanist Rembert Dodoens’s Cruydeboek into French (as Histoire des Plantes; 1557) and the Spanish botanist Nicolás Monardes’s Historia Medicinal into Latin (as De Simplicibus Medicamentis; 1574), making them more accessible and popular. Between 1563 and 1565, he traveled to Spain and Portugal as a tutor to a son of the wealthy Fugger family. A botanical account of this journey was published in 1576 as the Rariorum Aliquot Stirpium per Hispanias Observatarum Historia.

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Botanical pursuits and contributions to natural history

On the invitation of the Holy Roman emperor Maximilian II, Clusius established a botanical garden in Vienna and served as its director from 1573 to 1577. He stayed on in Vienna, traveling across Austria and its neighboring regions, visiting court gardens in search of plants. His observations of the Austrian flora were consolidated in his 1583 publication, Rariorum Aliquot Stirpium, per Pannoniam, Austriam, & Vicinas Quasdam Provincias Observatarum Historia. He continued to study exotic plants and develop hybrid tulip varieties during this time. In 1593 he accepted a professorship of botany at the Leiden University—a position he held until his death in 1609. Clusius also served as the prefect of the university’s botanical garden, where he planted his collection of tulip bulbs. These bloomed in 1594, marking the first recorded flowering of tulips in the Netherlands.

Over the course of his life, Clusius corresponded with more than 300 fellow plant enthusiasts across Europe, sharing with them seeds, bulbs, and botanical insights. He published his magnum opus, Rariorum Plantarum Historia, in 1601, which contained an unpublished work on fungi in addition to his earlier botanical observations. He was the first to recognize that “broken” tulips—those with streaks of different colors and highly prized for their beauty—were weak and likely to be short-lived. It has since been proved that variegation in tulips is caused by a virus. ( Tulip Mania: How a Plant Virus Fueled a Speculative Frenzy.)

Clusius also published a natural history volume in 1605, called Exoticorum Libri Decem, which focused on exotic animals. He accompanied his detailed descriptions of plants and animals with woodcuts, many of which were used by later authors in their works. A family of tropical trees and shrubs has been named Clusiaceae in his honor. The lady tulip, Tulipa clusiana, also honors his name.