On The Natural Order of Plants Called Proteaceae - Background

Background

Brown had been botanist during Matthew Flinders' circumnavigation of Australia, and since returning in England in 1805 he had been preparing descriptions of the specimens collected during the voyage. Brown's intention was to publish a flora of Australia, but this was still incomplete in September 1808 when Jonas Dryander asked Brown to write a monograph on the Proteaceae so that Dryander could use Brown's names in a new edition of Hortus Kewensis. Brown immediately set to work researching the topic.

In preparing the paper, Brown had unfettered access to the herbarium of his patron, Sir Joseph Banks, which included the specimens he had collected during Flinders' voyage, and which contained the most extensive collection of Proteaceae in the world. He was also given access to James Edward Smith's Linnean collection; the herbarium of Aylmer Bourke Lambert; the living collections of George Hibbert; the herbarium of William Aiton, which contained the collections of Francis Masson; and the collections of William Roxburgh. In addition he was accorded a brief examination of the specimens collected by Jacques Labillardière at Esperance Bay, on the southwest coast of Australia, where Brown had not collected.