Alexandre Boreau


Alexandre Boreau was a French pharmacist and botanist. He is the binomial authority of plants such as Polygonum arenastrum and Pulmonaria longifolia.

Biography

Boreau was born in Saumur, in the department of Maine-et-Loire on March 15, 1803. His father was a laborer, and upon his death he worked at baths established on the quay of the Loire, upstream of the Cessart bridge. Still a boy, he came protection of his godfather Abel Aubert Dupetit Thouars, an admiral. Boreau was able to study humanities at the college of Saumur. From 1820, however he began training to be a pharmacist while working in a dispensary in Angers. Within the framework of its studies, he enhanced his interest especially in botany, and he enrolled in courses and studied at the jardin des plantes d'Angers.
After his marriage to Antoinette Morin, in 1828 he acquired a dispensary in Nevers. He devoted himself to botany and research. He collaborated with Count Jaubert, Minister of Louis Philippe, which, who shared a passion for botany. A plant discovered in Central Asia is dedicated to him, the Boreava orientalis.
In 1840, Boreau published the first edition of its Flore du Centre de la France, a model of precision which becomes a noted reference book at the time. He kept busy at his town botanical garden, reorganizing the classifications and assisting in giving public courses. He published many works, in particular within the framework of the Academic Company of Maine-et-Loire.
Upon his death on May 5, 1875, his widow Antoinette Morin established a herbarium in his memory. It was later bought by the local government and today deposited in the house of Gaston Allard.