Linnaean taxonomy is the system of classification of living organisms that is used throughout the biological sciences. Its inventor, Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778), spent most of his career in Uppsala, Sweden. Starting with the plant kingdom, Linnaeus created a hierarchy in which plants are grouped, according to similarities in their appearance, into twenty-five phyla, and then each phylum into classes, and these in turn into orders, families, genera, and species. The first description of this system was published by Linnaeus in 1753, in a two-volume work, Species Plantarum. He later applied the same principles toanimals and minerals.
The most important feature of Linnaean taxonomy is a system known as binomial (or two-name). nomenclature. The first name identifies the genus-to which the organism belongs; the second name, its unique species: for example, the common daisy is Bellis perennis. If necessary, the family, order, and phylum to which a genus belongs can be looked up in a floral taxonomy reference book.
Linnaeus collected, studied, and classified plants and animals, publishing his findings in successive editions of Systems Naturae. The first edition, published in 1735, was just eleven pages long; the tenth edition, published in 1758, detailed 4,400 species of animals and 7,700 plant species. Linnaean taxonomy, although developed a hundred years before Darwin's theory of evolution, proved to be robust and effective even as scientists have explored the evolutionary relationships between organisms. More recently, comparisons of the genetic codes of individual species have led to some reclassification of plants and animals, but the essential concepts of Linnaean taxonomy remain entirely valid today.
