Book Review: The Komarov Botanical Institute

Peter the Great, in “an act of daring and sovereign self-confidence”, founded the city of St. Petersburg in “a subarctic wilderness” in the year 1703. Included in the early city were the Pharmaceutical Garden and a Botanical Museum, institutions which were merged in 1931 to form the present Komarov Botanical Institute. During these 250 years some of the world’s greatest botanists have worked there, including J. G. Siegesbeck, E. A. Regel, F. K. Ledebour, and V. L. Komarov (1869-1945), for whom the Institute is named.