Colonial Botany in Hamburg – Germany | Brazil | Tanzania
Themed tours
Daniel K. Manwire, 2024
Knowledge of plants played a very important role from the very beginning of European colonial expansion. Colonization was not only driven by shiny gold, but also by the desire for direct access to plants already known in Europe, such as pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg and other spices. The so-called "Columbus effect" from 1492 onwards marked the beginning of a major ecological and agricultural change on both sides of the Atlantic, and later worldwide: the exchange and interaction of unknown flora changed many areas of society enormously. Potatoes, corn, tomatoes, tobacco and peanuts, for example, were unknown outside of the Americas. Conversely, there were no coffee bushes nor sugar cane, onions or banana trees known to the Americas until they were imported from Europe, Africa and Asia.
Dyeing, food, pleasure, medicine, construction and textiles: plants were valuable raw materials. Some, such as Brazil wood ( ibirapitanga in the indigenous Tupi-Guarani language family) from the Atlantic coastal forests of Brazil, were directly cut down between the 16th and the end of the 18th century. Other plants such as indigo, cotton, tobacco and sugar cane had to be grown, tended, harvested and processed by enslaved people from Africa on plantations in the Americas before they were shipped to the port cities of Hamburg and Altona.
There, the precise botanical research and identification of plants from colonial areas went hand in hand with commercial interests in profitable plants and their cultivation conditions. Access to and appropriation of the indigenous knowledge associated with these resources also played a key role. This article highlights some of the places where botany emerged in Hamburg in connection with colonialism.
Contact:
hallo@bildungsbuero-hamburg.de
Weblinks:
www.bildunsgbuero-hamburg.de
Special Thanks:
Dr. Hans-Helmut Poppendieck, Dr. Petra Schwarz und Gabriele Kranz
References:
Grunert, Heino (Hrsg.): Von der Festung bis Planten un Blomen. Die Hamburger Wallanlagen, 2020.
Horbas, Claudia, Museum für Hamburgische Geschichte (Hrsg.): Gartenlust und Blumenliebe: Hamburgs Gartenkultur vom Barock bis ins 20. Jahrhundert: Hamburgs Gartenkultur vom Barock bis ins 20. Jahrhundert, 2006.
Kimmerer, Robin Wall: Geflochtenes Süßgras. Die Weisheit der Pflanzen, 2021.
Kranz, Gabriele: Hamburg's Botanical Museum and German colonialism: nature in the hands of science, commerce and political power. S. 71. In: Ramutsindela, M. / Miescher, G. / Boehi, M. (Ed.): The Politics of Nature and Science in Southern Africa , Basler Afrika Bibliographien, 2016, S. 59–86.
Poppendieck, Hans-Helmut / Bertram, Horst / Brandt, Ingo / Engelschall, Barbara / v. Prondzinski, Jörg: Der Hamburger Pflanzenatlas von a bis z, 2010.
Voigt, Albert: Die Botanischen Institute der Freien und Hansestadt Hamburg, 1897.
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This article was written as part of the project ‘Digital mapping of Hamburg's colonial history’. The project is a co-operation between the Hamburg Historical Museums Foundation, the working group HAMBURG POSTKOLONIAL and the Berlin joint project ‘Decolonial Culture of Remembrance in the City’. It is funded by the Hamburg Ministry of Culture and Media and the German Federal Cultural Foundation.
Coordination and editing: Anke Schwarzer, 2024
Stationen
Gardens of the city pharmacists, senators and mayors
Commercial nursery at the Dammthore
Botanical Garden on the Außenalster 1810-1813
Botanical Garden from 1821
Camellias and cacti in the "Glass Palace"
Botanical Museum
Botany for merchants
Fibers, fruits and dye wood
Amani in the Usambara Mountains