El Jardín Botánico de Madrid y sus relaciones con Francia

Abstract

The Botanical Garden from Madrid was created in 1755 with the purpose of studying and cultivate the medicinal plants. Its ulterior evolution is characterized for its relationship with the Garden of Plants of Paris, circumstance that retarded the application of the Linnean system in favor of the model of Tournefort. With the transfer of the Garden, in 1774, to its actual location of the Paseo del Prado, the French bond increases. The first professor, Casimiro Gómez Ortega, travels to Paris where he contacts with André Thouin, Duhamel de Monceau, and Buffon, whose botanical guidelines try to introduce at his return. But it will be at the posterior management of Claudio Boutelou, during the reign of José I, when the French presence in the Garden obtains its paramount influence. Influence and collaboration between the two institutions that continues today.