Overview

As naturalists began to expand their reach and study more and more of the Earth, they began to find such a bounty of plants and animals that the current and relatively informal practice of naming new discoveries quickly became outdated. Botanists and zoologists found themselves overwhelmed and unable to keep track of the different organisms. By the 1700s the problem had become severe. Swedish naturalist Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) recognized the need for a clear and logical method of classifying and naming living things. Thus, in his Systema naturae (1735) he introduced the practice of using two Latin names—one for genus, the other for species—to identify each different plant and animal known to man. This method, termed binomial nomenclature, is still used today. Baron Georges Cuvier (1769-1832) further refined the system of classification by providing...