Naturalist · 1707 – 1778

Carl Linnaeus

Little-Known Facts

  • He gave humans their scientific name, Homo sapiens.
  • He sent students he called his 'apostles' around the world to collect specimens.

Myths & Misconceptions

Did Linnaeus believe species could change?

He largely saw species as fixed; it was later naturalists like Darwin who showed that the orderly groups Linnaeus named are connected by evolution.