Berthold Carl Seemann
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Berthold Carl Seemann 25 February 1825 Hanover, Germany - 10 October 1871 Nicaragua, Central America, was a German botanist. He travelled widely and collected and described plants from the Pacific and South America.
In 1844 he travelled to the United Kingdom to studied botany at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. On the recommendation of Sir WJ Hooker, he was appointed naturalist on the voyage of exploration of the American west coast and Pacific by Henry Kellett on HMS Herald, 1847–1851, along with the naturalists Thomas Edmondston, and John Goodridge. The expedition returned via Hawaii, Hong Kong and the East Indies, calling at the Cape in March 1851. Here he met up with his old acquaintance Zeyher, and with Baur and Juritz they climbed Table Mountain on 13 March 1851, Ecklon being unwell and unable to accompany them. On 16 March Zeyher introduced him to Bowie at Wynberg. He left the Cape on 27 March and was back in England on 6 June 1851. The botanical results of the voyage were published as Botany of the Voyage of HMS Herald and he was awarded a Ph.D. by the University of Gottingen in 1853.
In 1859 he travelled to Fiji and published a botanical catalogue of the flora of the islands. In the 1860s he visited South America, travelling in Venezuela in 1864 and Nicaragua from 1866 to 1867. He later managed a sugar estate in Panama and the Javali gold mine in Nicaragua, where he finally succumbed to fever.
He started and edited the journal Bonplandia from 1853–1862 and the Journal of Botany, British and Foreign from 1863–1871.
The plant genus Seemannia Regel. (Gesneriaceae), Seemannantha Alef. and Seemannaralia R. Viguier (Araliaceae) were named in his honour.