William Griffith (botanist)

William Griffith in 1843

William Griffith (1810–1845) was a British doctor, naturalist, and botanist. Griffith's botanical publications are from India and Burma. After a brief stay in Madras, he was assigned as a Civil Surgeon to Tenasserim, Burma, where he studied local plants and made collecting trips to the Barak River valley in Assam. He explored various parts of Burma, traveling the rivers, including the Irrawadi as far as Rangoon. He visited the highlands of Sikkim, and the region of the Himalayas around Shimla. Subsequently, Griffith was appointed as Civil Surgeon in Malacca, where he died of a parasitic liver disease.

Selected publications

• Griffith, William (1847) Journals of Travels in Assam Burma Bootan Affghanistan and the Neighbouring Countries Bishop's College Press, Calcutta; reprinted 2001 Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, New Delhi.

References

• Lang, W. H. (1913) "William Griffith, 1810-1845" in Oliver, Francis W. (ed.) (1913) Makers of British Botany: A Collection of Biographies by Living Botanists Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, pp. 178-191, OCLC 5146484
• Arnold, David (2006) The Tropics and the Traveling Gaze: India, Landscape, and Science, 1800-1856 University of Washington Press, Seattle, pp. 16-17, 63, 65, 67, 144, 157, 159, 167, and 171-176, ISBN 0-295-98581-X

External links

• Works by William Griffith at Project Gutenberg
• "William Griffith British Botanist" The Beauty of Orchids and Flowers website