Ferdinand von Hochstetter

Ferdinand von Hochstetter

Hochstetter's map of the Auckland volcanic field, originally drawn in 1859 and published in the Geological and Topographical Atlas of New Zealand (1864)

Christian Gottlieb Ferdinand Ritter von Hochstetter (April 30, 1829 – July 18, 1884) was a German geologist.

He was born at Esslingen, Württemberg, the son of Christian Ferdinand Friedrich Hochstetter (1787-1860), a clergyman and professor at Bonn, who was also a botanist and mineralogist. Having received his early education at the evangelical seminary at Maulbronn, Ferdinand proceeded to the University of Tübingen and the Tübinger Stift; there, under FA Quenstedt, the interest he already felt in geology became permanently fixed, and he obtained his doctor's degree and a travelling scholarship.

In 1852 he joined the staff of the Imperial Geological Survey of Austria and was engaged until 1856 in parts of Bohemia, especially in the Böhmerwald, and in the Fichtel Hills and Karlsbad mountains. His excellent reports established his reputation. Thus he came to be chosen as geologist to the Novara expedition (1857–59), and made numerous valuable observations in the voyage round the world.

In 1859 he was employed by the government of New Zealand to make a rapid geological survey of the islands. On his return he was appointed in 1860 professor of mineralogy and geology at the Imperial-Royal Polytechnic Institute in Vienna, and in 1876 he was made superintendent of the Imperial Natural History Museum. In these later years he explored portions of Turkey and eastern Russia, and he published papers on a variety of geological, palaeontological and mineralogical subjects. He died in Oberdöbling near Vienna, at age 55.

Hochstetter Peak on Trinity Peninsula in Antarctica is named after Ferdinand von Hochstetter.^[1]

Taxonomy

New Zealand's endemic Hochstetter's frog, Leiopelma hochstetteri, is named after Ferdinand. Several other species bear his name in their scientific names, including the Takahe, Porphyrio hochstetteri, and Powelliphanta hochstetteri, a species (with five subspecies) of New Zealand's giant carnivorous land snails.

Publications

• Karlsbad, seine geognostischen Verhältnisse und seine Quellen (1858)
• Neu-Seeland (1863); published in English as New Zealand: its physical geography, geology, and natural history: with special reference to the results of government expeditions in the provinces of Auckland and Nelson (1867) [1]
• Geological and Topographical Atlas of New Zealand (1864)
• The geology of New Zealand: in explanation of the geographical and topographical atlas of New Zealand] (1864) [2]
• Leitfaden der Mineralogie and Geologie (with A Bisching) (1876, ed. 8, 1890).

See also

• European and American voyages of scientific exploration

Notes

Regarding personal names: Ritter is a title, translated approximately as Knight, not a first or middle name. There is no equivalent female form.

1. ^ SCAR Composite Gazetteer of Antarctica

References

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

External links

• Ferdinand von Hochstetter and the Austrian Novara Scientific Expedition 1858-9
• Te Ara 1966 article
• Dictionary of New Zealand Biography article

Persondata
Name	Hochstetter, Ferdinand von
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	April 30, 1829
Place of birth
Date of death	July 18, 1884
Place of death