François Le Vaillant

François Levaillant (born Vaillant, later in life as Le Vaillant, "The Valiant") (6 August 1753 – 22 November 1824) was a French writer, explorer, naturalist, zoological collector, travel writer, and noted ornithologist. He described many new species of birds based on birds he collected in Africa and several birds are named after him. He was among the first to use colour plates for illustrating birds and opposed the use of binomial nomenclature introduced by Carl Linnaeus, preferring instead to use descriptive French names such as the bateleur (meaning "tumbler or tight-rope walker") for the distinctive African eagle.

Life

François Vaillant was born in Paramaribo, the capital of Dutch Guiana (Surinam), the son of Nicolas François, a French lawyer from Metz who had fled there after eloping with his mother Catherine Joséphine and then took up a position as the French Consul. Growing up amid forests, François took an interest in the local fauna, collecting birds and insects. His family returned to France in 1763. In 1772, François joined the Berry cavalry regiment as a cadet officer in Metz but was eventually rejected as an officer because he was not tall enough. He married Suzanne de Noor in 1773. He worked with a local apothecary, Becoeur, who had developed an arsenic-based soap to preserve birds. In 1777, he moved to Paris and started a career as a trader in natural history specimens.

Cape travels

He went to the Cape of Good Hope in 1780, at the age of 27, nominally as a gunner's mate for the Dutch East India Company, but almost certainly sponsored by the Treasurer-General, Jacob Temminck with the understanding that he would strengthen Temminck's collection. He decided to study the bird and animal life in their natural habitat. At that time, South Africa was a relatively unknown and exotic location and he collected specimens that would establish his reputation within the scientific community until July 1784 when he made his way back to Holland and France. He made three journeys, one around Cape Town and Saldanha Bay (April to August 1781), one eastwards from the Cape (December 1781 to May 1783) and the third to the Orange River and into Great Namaqualand (June 1783 to c. May 1784). Researchers have to some extent adjusted the dates supplied by Levaillant. During the first expedition his collection was on the vessel Middelburg, which was attacked and sunk by the English in Saldanha Bay. He did however manage to return with over 2000 specimens of birds, insects, mammals and plants. During this trip he changed his name to Le Vaillant.