Edward Forbes FRS, FGS (12 February 1815 – 18 November 1854) was a Manx naturalist. In 1846, he proposed that the distributions of montane plants and animals had been compressed downslope, and some oceanic islands connected to the mainland, during the recent ice age. This mechanism, which was the first natural explanation to explain the distributions of the same species on now-isolated islands and mountain tops, was discovered independently by Charles Darwin, who credited Forbes with the idea. He also incorrectly deduced the so-called azoic hypothesis, that life under the sea would decline to the point that no life forms could exist below a certain depth.

Early years

thumb|Bust of Edward Forbes by Sir [[John Steell|alt=|left|266x266px]]Forbes was born at Douglas in the Isle of Man. His father was a well-to-do banker. As a child, Forbes was very interested in collecting insects, shells, minerals, fossils, and plants. Due to poor health, he was unable to attend school from his 5th through his 11th years. In 1828, he started attending the Athole House Academy in Douglas.

In June 1831, Forbes moved to London to study drawing but was not admitted by the Royal Academy. However, having given up on art as a profession, he trained privately and moved back to Douglas. In later years, Forbes used his artistic abilities to create humorous drawings for his publications.

In November 1832, Forbes matriculated as a medical student in the University of Edinburgh attending the lectures of Robert Jameson and Robert Knox while also being active in student societies. In 1832, he studied the natural history of the Isle of Man. Forbes's brother David was a notable mineralogist.

Travels

In 1833, Forbes travelled to Norway to study its botanical resources. His findings were published in Loudon's Magazine of Natural History for 1835–1836. The British Association funded his studies based on dredging in the Irish Sea for biological specimens. In 1835, he travelled in France, Switzerland and Germany to study their natural histories.

In 1836, Forbes abandoned his medical studies and moved to Paris, where he attended the lectures at the Jardin des Plantes on natural history, comparative anatomy, geology and mineralogy. In April 1837, Forbes traveled to Algiers to gather material for a paper on land and freshwater Mollusca. The paper was published in the Annals of Natural History, vol. ii. p. 250. He remained in Edinburgh, paid for by his father.

Illustrations

Forbes's scientific illustrations have been said to be anthropomorphic, often just hiding a human form even when depicting an invertebrate.

In November 1854, soon after the start of winter classes at Edinburgh, Forbes became ill. He died at Wardie Parish, near Edinburgh, on 18 November 1854. He was interred at the Dean Cemetery in Edinburgh.

In 1859, a former student of Forbes; James Hector dedicated Mount Forbes in what is now Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada to his memory.

The following Forbes works were issued posthumously:

  • On the Tertiary Fluviomarine Formation of the Isle of Wight (Geol. Survey), edited by RAC Godwin-Austen (1856)
  • The Natural History of the European Seas, edited and continued by RAC Godwin-Austen (1859).

Forbes's widow provided papers to George Wilson to write up the memoirs of Forbes. Wilson however died in 1859 and his sister then passed on the papers to Archibald Geikie who had met Forbes only twice. Forbes's widow married Major Yelverton in 1858 and forbade Geikie to work on the memoirs, seeking back all the papers. Forbes's brother however wished that Geikie finish the book as did the publisher Alexander Macmillan. In 1860, it was found that Yelverton had earlier married Maria Teresa Longworth and the separation had not been made with a witness. Yelverton was accused of bigamy and Teresa Longworth wrote about her plight in a book Martyrs to Circumstance. Mrs Forbes had two sons by Yelverton and with the case being in the limelight, she had no time to apply pressure on Geikie. Geikie however had to exercise considerable diplomacy while writing the biography as Forbes had claimed that he had been sufficiently remunerated by the School of Mines.

See also

  • European and American voyages of scientific exploration
  • "The New Museum Idea"

Notes

References

;Attribution

  • Endnotes:
  • Literary Gazette (25 November 1854);
  • Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal (New Ser.), (1855);
  • Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. (May 1855);
  • G. Wilson and A. Geikie, Memoir of Edward Forbes (1861), in which, pp. 575–583, is given a list of Forbes's writings.
  • Literary Papers, edited by Lovell Reeve (1855).
  • Memoir of Edward Forbes, by George Wilson and Archibald Geikie (MacMillan and Edmonston co., 1861)
  • Edward Forbes obituary, by Thomas Huxley (Journal of Science and Literary Gazette, 1854); Clarke College
  • Manx Worthies: Professor Edward Forbes (and part 2), by A.W. Moore (The Manx Note Book, Vol. iii, 1887)
  • Chrono-biographical sketch ; Western Kentucky University