Amalie Dietrich

Amalie Dietrich
Photograph of Amalie Dietrich, c. 1870.
Born (1821-05-26)26 May 1821
Siebenlehn, Saxony, Germany
Died (1891-03-09)9 March 1891
Germany
Nationality German
Other names Koncordie Amalie Dietrich
Occupation Natural history collector, museum curator, explorer
Known for Collecting type specimens for the Godefroy Museum

Koncordie Amalie Dietrich (née Nelle) (26 May 1821 – 9 March 1891)[1] was a German naturalist who was best known for her pioneering work in Australia from 1863 to 1872, collecting specimens for the Museum Godeffroy in Hamburg.[2]

Early life

Amalie Dietrich was born in Siebenlehn, Saxony, German Confederation. In 1846, Amalie married Wilhelm August Salomo Dietrich, a doctor. With no formal training Amalie learnt all she could from Wilhelm about collecting. and they planned careers working as naturalists. Between 1845 and 1862 she and her husband made a precarious living collecting Alpine specimens to sell to chemists for medicines and to museums for their natural history collections.[3] Some of the delicate alpine flowers Amalie collected in this period can be seen on display in the Natural History Museum in Freiburg.[4]

Charitas, their only daughter, was born in 1848. It appears Wilhelm began spending most of his time mounting the specimens and the burden of collecting them fell to Amalie. This meant long, lonely, periods away from home which were made even worse after her only child, Charitas, was born. Her husband refused to look after his daughter and she was boarded out to strangers, and eventually, in 1859, left her to fend for herself. Finally in 1861 Amalie found out he was having an affair and she broke with him completely.[5]

Australia

After leaving Wilhelm she travelled to Hamburg where she found work with the industrialist and natural history collector Johann Cesar VI. Godeffroy (1818 - 1885), a wealthy shipping magnate who at the time was establishing the Museum Godeffroy.[6] Godeffroy agreed to hire her as a collector in Australia but Amalie had to sign a ten-year contract and leave her daughter behind in Germany. Her friend, a collector named Dr Meyer, and his wife, agreed to look after Charitas as well as provide for her education.[7][8] Amalie left Hamburg on 15 May 1863 and travelled to Brisbane, Australia, arriving on August 7, 1863.[9]

Portrait of Amalie Dietrich on her sixtieth birthday, drawn by Christian Wilhelm Allers, 1881.

Amalie was known to many collectors through her earlier work, but the cases and barrels containing stuffed animals, insects, mammals and plants which arrived at the Hamburg docks from Queensland increased her reputation. Over these ten years she collected in Brisbane (1863–1864); Gladstone (1864-1865); Rockhampton (1864-1866); Mackay (1867); Lake Elphinstone (1868); Mackay (1869); and Bowen (1869-1870).[10] Bowen is also where she also began collecting skeletal remains of local Indigenous Australians to send back to Godeffroy’s in Germany.[11] She returned to the German Empire in 1872.

Naturalists in Europe named many species after her. These include:

Aongstroemia dietrichiae Mull.Hal. (1868), Laxmannia illicebrosa Rchb.f. (1871), Marsdenia hemiptera Reichenbach (1871), Fissidens dietrichiae Mull.Hal. (1872), Macromitrium sordidevirens Mull.Hal. (1872), Sargassum aciculare Grunow (1874), Sargassum amaliae Grunow (1874), Sargassum godeffroyi Grunow (1874), Schoenus elatus Boeck. (1875), Scirpus dietrichiae Boeck. (1875), Scleria dietrichiae Boeck. (1875), Scleria novae-hollandiae Boeck. (1875), Carex dietrichiae Boeck. (1875), Cyperus luerssenii Boeck. (1875), Acacia dietrichiana F.Muell. (1882), Barbula subcalycina Mull.Hal. (1882), Frullania dietrichana Steph. (1910), Indigofera amaliae Domin (1915), Acacia penninervis var. longiracemosa Domin (1926), Cryptocarya multicostata Domin (1926), Cryptocarya triplinervis var. euryphylla Domin (1926), Psoralea dietrichiae Domin (1926), Swainsona luteola var. dietrichiae Domin (1926), Tetrastigma nitens var. amaliae Domin (1927), Plectronia coprosmoides var. spathulata O.Swartz (1927), Premna benthamiana Domin (1928), Hibiscus amaliae Domin (1930), Mallotus claoxyloides f. grossedentata Domin (1930), Mallotus claoxyloides var. glabratus Domin (1930), Pagetia dietrichiae Domin (1930), Persoonia amaliae Domin (1930), Cyperus pumilus var. nervulosus Kuk. (1936), Helichrysum eriocephalum J.H.Willis (1952) Nortonia amaliae Drosera dietrichiana [12]

Her collections formed the basis of Zur Flora von Queensland by C. Luerssen. She never published anything in her name; however, her collections remain in museums in Europe to this day.

References

  1. ↑ "Encyclopedia of Australian Science".
  2. ↑ The Hard Road, Charitas Bischoff, Martin Hopkinson Ltd, London, 1931, p.234
  3. ↑ Amalie Dietrich 1821-1891, Studies in International Cultural relations, Number 29, Instiut fur Auslandsbeziehungen, Suttgart, SBUndersrepublik, Dueutschland, 1988, p.13
  4. ↑ Amalie Dietrich 1821-1891, Studies in International Cultural relations, Number 29, Instiut fur Auslandsbeziehungen, Suttgart, SBUndersrepublik, Dueutschland, 1988, p.13
  5. ↑ The White Falcon, Pacific Books, 1963, p.52
  6. ↑ The White Falcon, Pacific Books, 1963, p.4
  7. ↑ M.F. (11 October 1911). "A Woman Botanist". Fairfax Media. The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 28 December 2016.
  8. ↑ The White Falcon, Pacific Books, 1963, p.4
  9. ↑ The Hard Road, Charitas Bischoff, Martin Hopkinson Ltd, London, 1931, p. 237
  10. ↑ Dietrich, Konkordia Amalie (nee Nelle), Council of Heads of Australasian Herbaria, https://www.anbg.gov.au/biography/dietrich-amalie.html
  11. ↑ The White Falcon, Pacific Books, 1963, p.63
  12. ↑ Dietrich, Konkordia Amalie (nee Nelle), Council of Heads of Australasian Herbaria, https://www.anbg.gov.au/biography/dietrich-amalie.html
  • Australian Science Archives Project. 1998. Amalie Dietrich 1821- 1891
  • The Letters of Amalie Dietrich
  • Serle, Percival (1949). "Dietrich, Amalie". Dictionary of Australian Biography. Sydney: Angus and Robertson.
  • Queensland Photographs at Pitt-Rivers Museum
  • The Hard Road, Charitas Bischoff, Martin Hopkinson Ltd, London, 1931
  • Dietrich, Lodewyckx, & Lodewyckx, A. (1943). Australische Briefe / von Amalie Dietrich ; with a biographical sketch, exercises and a vocabulary, edited by Augustin Lodewyckx. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press in association with Oxford University Press.
  • Bischoff, C. (1914). " Amalie Dietrich, ein Leben von Charitas Bischoff. (Grote'sche Sammlung von Werken zeitgenössischer Schriftsteller; Bd. 97). Berlin: Grote.
  • Lüttge, U., & Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen. (1988). " Amalie Dietrich (1821-1891) German biologist in Australia, homage to Australia's Bicentenary, 1988 / edited by Ulrich Lüttge. (Studies in international cultural relations ; v. 29). Stuttgart: Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen.
  • Sumner, R. (1993). A woman in the wilderness, The story of Amalie Dietrich in Australia, Ray Sumner. Kensington, NSW, Australia: New South Wales University Press.
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