Lennart von Post

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Ernst Jakob Lennart von Post
Swedish Geological Survey, Stockholms Högskola

Ernst Jakob Lennart von Post (16 June 1884 – 11 January 1951)

naturalist and geologist. He was the first to publish quantitative analysis of pollen and is counted as one of the founders of palynology. He was a professor at Stockholm University 1929–1950.[2]

Early life

Lennart von Post was born in Johannesberg, near Västerås in Västmanland County, Sweden. He was the son of Carl-Fabian Axel von Post (1849-1927) and Beata Jacqueline Charlotta Christina (1852-1885). Von Post was an only child. His father served in the Swedish Army as a judge-advocate but also worked as a civilian lawyer, farmer and assistant cantonal judge.[3]

Education

Von Post studied geology at

isostatic rebound and post glacial transgression in Sweden.[5]

Scientific career

Von Post worked for the

Swedish Geological Survey for 21 years as a peat specialist. During this time he developed the technique of using pollen grains to build stratigraphies that could be used to correlate peat layers locally. By 1916, along with work by (Gustav?) Lagerheim for N.O. Holst,[6] the concept of using pollen to describe immigration of plant species and changes in the relative numbers of plants took hold.[3] This work led to the publication of the first modern pollen diagram in 1916, the same year that von Post presented his now famous lecture in Christiania, although the two pertained to different subject matter.[3]

His work was seminal in beginning the field of palynology however von Post rarely published in a language other than Swedish meaning his work did not reach the wide audience that others, including Gunnar Erdtman, did.[7] Regardless, von Post was highly influential, working with palynologists including Gunnar Erdtman, Knut Fægri and others. It is notable however that conflict between Erdtman and von Post led to Erdtman's relative obscurity in academia for a number of years.[7]

Von Post discovered by accident a small canyon near Degerfors in 1923 which he then held was the elusive outlet of the Ancylus Lake. His idea received support and led to a collaboration with Henrik Munthe, a colleague from the Geological Survey of Sweden. However they fell into personal disputes and collaboration ended in 1927.[8] Von Post's proposed outlet, named Svea River, was never fully accepted with alternative theories for the origin of the canyon being proposed. Notably Astrid Cleve-Euler proposed in 1946 the canyon was formed by subglacial drainage of a lake.[8] The existence of Svea River was fully discarded in 1981 when potholes in it were found to contain sediments that predate the Ancylus Lake.[9]

At the time of his death in 1951 von Post was preparing a large study on Klarälven which was left unfinished.[10]

Awards and recognition

The standard author abbreviation L.Post is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.[11]

References

  1. ^ Obituary by J. Iversen (1951); Bulletin of the Geological Society of Denmark 12(1): 155-119 Danish full text
  2. ^ "E J Lennart Post, von". Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Retrieved 1 September 2020.
  3. ^
    hdl:1874/15873
    .
  4. doi:10.2475/ajs.295.5.491
    .
  5. JSTOR 519462
    .
  6. ^ Holst, N.O. (1909). "Postglaciala tidsbestämningar". Sveriges Geol. Undersökn. Årsbok. Ser. C: Avhandl. Och Uppsat.: 216.
  7. ^ a b Fægri, Knut (1973). "In memoriam: O. Gunnar E. Erdtman". Pollen et Spores. 15: 5–12. Archived from the original on 3 April 2010.
  8. ^
    doi:10.1080/11035896709448372
    .
  9. doi:10.1080/11035898209454547
    .
  10. JSTOR 520285
    .
  11. ^ International Plant Names Index.  L.Post.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lennart_von_Post&oldid=1184079998"