Ferdinand Mueller and the royal Society of Victoria

Abstract

During the 1850s the botanist Ferdinand Mueller (later von Mueller) played a leading role in the affairs of the predecessor societies of the Royal Society of Victoria. He was president of the last of these, the Philosophical Institute of Victoria, when in January 1860 it was granted permission to style itself the Royal Society of Victoria. The formation of these societies also advanced Mueller’s own career at a crucial stage of its development. In particular, their commitment to publishing volumes of Transactions provided Mueller with a vehicle for publishing descriptions of the many new species he was identifying in the Australian flora, thus freeing him from his former dependence on collea..