The things you learn - Linnaeus edition

I have a reasonable knowledge of Carl Linnaeus, his life and his work. From Wikipedia:

Carl Linnaeus (/lɪˈniːəs, lɪˈneɪəs/; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement as Carl von Linné, was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who formalised the modern system of naming organisms called binomial nomenclature. He is known by the epithet "father of modern taxonomy". Many of his writings were in Latin, and his name is rendered in Latin as Carolus Linnæus (after 1761 Carolus a Linné).

Linnaeus was born in the countryside of Småland, in southern Sweden. He received most of his higher education at Uppsala University, and began giving lectures in botany there in 1730. He lived abroad between 1735 and 1738, where he studied and also published a first edition of his Systema Naturae in the Netherlands. He then returned to Sweden, where he became professor of medicine and botany at Uppsala. In the 1740s, he was sent on several journeys through Sweden to find and classify plants and animals. In the 1750s and 1760s, he continued to collect and classify animals, plants, and minerals, and published several volumes. At the time of his death, he was one of the most acclaimed scientists in Europe.

The philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau sent him the message: "Tell him I know no greater man on earth." The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote: "With the exception of Shakespeare and Spinoza, I know no one among the no longer living who has influenced me more strongly." Swedish author August Strindberg wrote: "Linnaeus was in reality a poet who happened to become a naturalist". Among other compliments, Linnaeus has been called Princeps botanicorum (Prince of Botanists), "The Pliny of the North," and "The Second Adam". He is also considered as one of the founders of modern ecology.

In biology there are type specimens (or lectotypes).

A lectotype is a specimen later selected to serve as the single type specimen for species originally described from a set of syntypes. In zoology, a lectotype is a kind of name-bearing type. When a species was originally described on the basis of a name-bearing type consisting of multiple specimens, one of those may be designated as the lectotype. Having a single name-bearing type reduces the potential for confusion, especially considering that it is not uncommon for a series of syntypes to contain specimens of more than one species.

The type specimen for a species is often the first one discovered and is usually taxidermied or desiccated and kept in one of the great natural history museums of the world.

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Large ground finch (Geospiza magnirostris) specimen collected by Robert FitzRoy in the Galapagos islands during the voyage of the Beagle.

I knew a fair amount about Carl Linnaeus but this I did not know. Carl Linnaeus is the type specimen for the human species.

I found that quite startling and had visions of Linnaeus as type specimen Bentham-like in a museum somewhere.

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The embalmed body of Jeremy Bentham at University College London

Fortunately, the reality is a bit more prosaic. Linnaeus is entombed at Uppsala Cathedral in Sweden.

Who is the type of Homo sapiens? by David Notton and Chris Stringer explains (references omitted):

The type specimen of Homo sapiens is Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778). In Linnaeus' 10th edition of Systema Naturae (Linnaeus, 1758) which is taken to be the starting point of zoological nomenclature, he described Homo sapiens including 6 named subgroups, i.e. ferus, americanus, europaeus, asiaticus, afer and monstrosus. Ferus and monstrosus are infrasubspecific because the content of the description shows that ferus is used for feral children, those found in the wild, differing only as a consequence of their upbringing, and monstrosus is used for a mix of unrelated forms (part a) and people with modifications of the body due to human artifice (part b). Consequently ferus and monstrosus are not available names and do not enter into zoological nomenclature. This leaves as available names americanus, europaeus, asiaticus, and afer, which are subspecific names of Homo sapiens (Article 45.6). Also from the principle of coordination there must be a subspecific name sapiens, and the type of Homo sapiens is by definition the type of the subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens (Article 43).

Linnaeus did not designate a type for Homo sapiens or any of its nominal subspecies - that was not the custom then. However, the type series consists of all the specimens he included (Article 72.4) according to the characters given in his descriptions. The description of Homo sapiens is drawn broadly; it spreads over five pages, starting "H[omo] diurnus; varians cultura, loco." Then describing the 6 subgroups, continuing with the general description from the end of the description of monstrosus to page 24, from "Habitat inter Tropicos" to "Pedes Talis incedentes". The description for Homo sapiens sapiens is all the parts of the description that do not include the named subgroups and similarly the type material is all those specimens included by Linnaeus, not including those referred to under the named subgroups (Article 72.4.1).

It is certain that Linnaeus was present when he wrote this description and that he regarded himself as included in Homo sapiens. That he is not part of any of his subgroups is clear from the descriptions, in particular he is certainly not part of Homo sapiens europaeus since this subspecies is described as 'Pilis flavescentibus, prolixis. Oculis caeruleis' whereas Linnaeus has brown hair and eyes (Tullberg, 1907). He is therefore included in the type series of Homo sapiens sapiens (Article 72.4.1.1). There was, however, no single person recognised as the type until 1959, when Professor William Stearn, in a passing remark in a paper on Linnaeus' contributions to nomenclature and systematics wrote that 'Linnaeus himself, must stand as the type of his Homo sapiens'. This was enough to designate Linnaeus as a lectotype (Article 74.5), the single name bearing type specimen for the species Homo sapiens and its subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens.

Whew.

I am glad that it was not Linnaeus who designated himself as the specimen type. That would have been a little unseemly.