Ep. 360 | Plant Hunters during the Qing Dynasty (Part 2)

The China History Podcast

Laszlo Montgomery

Places & Travel, Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 19 March 2025

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This is the second of a two-part mini-series introducing the world of European plant hunting in China. In this episode, we look at some of the more noteworthy names and their accomplishments. After the exploits of Robert Fortune, many other plant hunters followed in his footsteps to China. We'll look at Henry Fletcher Hance, Père David, Augustine Henry, Ernest Wilson, and George Forrest, among others. Thanks to all for for listening. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:30.0	Greetings all CHP listeners. Thanks for coming back for more Qing era plant hunting. Part two this time.
0:36.4	You're listening to the China History podcast,
0:39.2	and I'm your host, Laszla Montgomery, since 2010, if you will. Last time, we looked at the
0:47.1	early plant hunters who came from Europe to China. We saw how, in the beginning at least, those
0:53.1	carrying out all manners of botanizing were doing this only as a side activity and by no means was plan collecting a top priority and certainly not their area of expertise.
1:05.0	Not until the mid-1800s did a gaggle of trained professional botanists start arriving in China. From the earliest
1:15.7	explorations carried out by Portuguese Jesuits in the 16th century, up until the early 19th century,
1:22.3	plant hunting was carried out as a, you know, while you're out there, can you also look for new plant
1:26.9	species kind of thing.
1:29.2	After the treaty ports started opening, and with the well-known success of Robert Fortune and China, between 1843 and 1851,
1:38.2	plant hunters, the world over, started migrating in the general direction of China. And after 1860, everyone's favorite foreign imperialist powers and their unequal treaties
1:50.8	had gamed the system sufficiently enough so that anyone could go almost anywhere in China
1:57.7	and proselytize, engage in commerce, sell weapons, or seek out new plant specimens.
2:05.8	No more restrictions and what restrictions there were. Someone would find a way to flout them.
2:11.8	By fortune's time in the mid-19th century, enough had already been brought back from China
2:17.1	for commercial horticulturalists with a
2:20.0	discerning eye for nice profits to take notice. And this added another layer to this world of
	...

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