from
Herbarium Amboinense Rumphius is best known for his authorship of
Het Amboinsche kruidboek or
Herbarium Amboinense, a
catalogue of the plants of the island of
Amboina (in modern-day Indonesia), published posthumously in 1741. The work covers 1,200 species, 930 with definite species names, and another 140 identified to genus level. The publication of this book was possible because of the governor
Johannes Camphuys. Camphuys, an amateur astronomer, personally reviewed the manuscript and ensured a copy was made before the ill-fated manuscript was sent off to Europe for printing. Rumphius provided illustrations and descriptions for nomenclature types for 350 plants, and his material contributed to the later development of the
binomial scientific classification by
Linnaeus. Despite the distance, he was in communication with scientists in Europe, was a member of a scientific society in
Vienna, and even sent a collection of Moluccan sea shells to the
Medicis in
Tuscany. After going blind in 1670 due to
glaucoma, Rumphius continued work on his six-volume manuscript with the help of others. His wife and a daughter were killed by a wall collapse during a
major earthquake and tsunami on 17 February 1674. On 11 January 1687, with the project nearing completion, a great fire in the town destroyed his library, numerous manuscripts, original illustrations for his
Herbarium Amboinense, volumes of the
Hortus Malabaricus, and works by Jacobus Bontius. Rumphius died in 1702, so he never saw his work in print; the embargo was lifted in 1704, but then no publisher could be found for it. It finally appeared in 1741, thirty-nine years after Rumphius's death, within a Latin translation by Johannes Burman (1707–79). Much of the natural history in Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indiën ("Old and New East-India") by
François Valentijn was by Rumphius and they were close friends. '', 1706 The original manuscript of
Het Amboinsch Kruidboek (MS BPL 314) is held at
Leiden University Libraries and a digital version is available in its Digital Collections. The
Herbarium Amboinense as published in 1741 consisted of six large folio volumes. Being blind, Rumphius required the assistance of others to produce it. His wife, Suzanna, was one of the early assistants and she was commemorated in
Flos Susannae a white orchid (now
Pecteilis susannae) described by Rumphius. His son Paul August made many of the plant illustrations as well as the only known portrait of Rumphius. Other assistants included Philips van Eyck, a draughtsman, Daniel Crul, Pieter de Ruyter (a soldier trained by Van Eyck), Johan Philip Sipman, Christiaen Gieraerts J. Hoogeboom illustrated in ''D'Amboinsche Rariteitkamer
At the beginning of the 20th century Elmer Drew Merrill and Charles Budd Robinson published an interpretation of the Herbarium Ambroinense
. Robinson recollected plants described by Rumphius and distributed the herbarium specimens in his exsiccata-like series called C. B. Rogerson: Plantae Rumphianae Amboinenses''. Among the many species described in the
Herbarium was the upas tree (
Antiaris toxicaria); the toxicity of the tree was exaggerated and caught the fancy of Europeans. Other plants included a description of the clove, the starfruit and durian. Rumphius used multinomial names and his descriptions were largely missed by Linnaeus as he received it after he had worked on
Species Plantarum. The other major work, ''D'Amboinsche Rariteitkamer'' ("Amboinese Cabinet of Curiosities"), a manuscript he had sent to Dr Hendrik D'Acquet of
Delft in 1701, consisted mainly of plates of seashells and crabs. After Rumphius' death, his son Paul August was appointed "merchant of Amboina", the position his father had held. A monument was erected to the memory of Rumphius at Amboina, but this was destroyed by the English, who mistakenly believed they would find gold under it. In 1824 a second monument was built by Governor-General van der Capellen, but this was destroyed by a bomb in World War II. ==Works==