Emilie Snethlage

Henriette Mathilde Maria Elizabeth Emilie (Mila) Snethlage
Born April 13, 1868
Gransee-Kraaz, Brandenburg district, Germany
Died November 25, 1929
Porto Velho, Madeira River, Brazil
Citizenship Brazilian
Nationality German
Fields Botany, Ornithology
Institutions Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi
Alma mater Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg in Breisgau
Doctoral advisor August Weismann
Known for Amazonian ornithology
Influences Emílio Goeldi, Bertha Lutz
Notable awards Brazilian Academy of Sciences
Notes
This remarkable woman opened science
as a profession for Brazilian women.

Maria Emilie Snethlage (April 13, 1868 – November 25, 1929) was a German-born Brazilian naturalist and ornithologist who worked on the bird fauna of the Amazon. Snethlage collected in Brazil from 1905 until her death.

Maria Emilie Snethlage was born in Kraatz (now part of Gransee) in the Province of Brandenburg, Prussia, and educated privately at her father's house (Rev. Emil Snethlage). In 1900, after years working as a governess, she took up natural history. Snethlage was a doctor in Natural Philosophy and had been a zoological assistant at the Berlin Natural History Museum before being hired by Emílio Goeldi for the natural history museum in Belém on the recommendation of Dr. A. Reichenow. Her work in the Brazilian Amazon took her to Acre and other remote places.

She became the director of the Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi, after the death of botanist Jacques Hüber, between 1914 and 1922. She wrote the Catálogo das Aves Amazônicas (1914). Snethlage was granted honorary membership in the British Ornithologists' Union in 1915. In 1921 she went to the National Museum in Rio de Janeiro, as "naturalista viajante." She continued her studies of the Brazilian avifauna with field trips to Minas Gerais, Maranhão, Ceará, Espírito Santo, Santa Catarina, Paraná, São Paulo state, and the Brazilian Amazon.

She died of heart failure in Porto Velho, on the Madeira River, while on a field trip. In her last letter, written shortly before she died, Snethlage mentions meeting the English butterfly collector Margaret Fountaine.

Her nephew was the ethnologist Dr. Emil Heinrich Snethlage.

The Madeira Parakeet Pyrrhura snethlageae, described as new to science in 2002, was named in her honour.

Publications (partial list)

Sources:

The standard author abbreviation Snethl. is used to indicate this individual as the author when citing a botanical name.[1]

References

  1. ^ "Author Query". International Plant Names Index. http://www.ipni.org/ipni/authorsearchpage.do. 

External links