John Ray
Ray, John (1627-1705) was an English naturalist who, during the 1600's, first suggested the idea of species in classification. He became known as the founder of systematic zoology.
Ray was born on Nov. 29, 1627, in Black Notley, in Essex, England, the son of a blacksmith and amateur herbalist and medical practioner. He attended school in Braintree and then studied at Trinity College, Cambridge, earning a B.A. degree in 1648 and an M.A. degree in 1651. He became a fellow of Trinity College in 1649, lecturing in Greek, mathematics, and humanities.
From 1658 to 1662, he traveled over much of Britain collecting specimens and recording information. In 1660, he and some friends anonymously published a record of the plants in Cambridgeshire, the first such county record.
From 1662 to 1666, he traveled throughout western Europe with Francis Willughby, a former pupil. Together they collected various specimens and attempted to classify them. Ray classified plant life and Willughby classified animal life. After Willughby died in 1672, Ray continued Willughby's work on animal life.
Ray moved back to Black Notley around 1680, developed a systematic survey of plant and animal life, and published a series of classificatory and historical volumes. His pioneering works were Catalogus Plantarum Angliae (1670), Methodus Plantarum Nova (1682), and Historia Plantarum (3 volumes, 1686–1704). In The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation (1691), Ray discussed the adaptation of organisms to their environment.
Ray based his classifications on accurate observation and identification. He rejected the mythological material that was common in works of botany and zoology. His classification set the stage for Carolus Linnaeus, the Swedish naturalist and botanist who established the modern scientific method of naming plants and animals in the 1700's.
Ray was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1667. The Ray Society was founded in 1844 and named in honor of Ray. It publishes academic works that are of interest to naturalists, zoologists, botanists, and collectors.