Trading the Globe’s Flora from the German Provinces: The Unio Itineraria in Esslingen, 1827-1845

In the first half of the nineteenth century, a scientific society called the Unio Itineraria was formed in Esslingen, a small town near Stuttgart in what was then the German states. Operating as a joint-stock company for the collection, sale, and distribution of botanical specimens, it became well-known and well-respected as a mechanism to acquire plants from around the world in Europe. This paper argues that this provincial organization and its attached naturalists facilitated a transnational network of plant exchange and provides a unique case in understanding the relationship between scientific credibility and the specimen trade. Likewise, it will demonstrate how the Regensburg-based journal Flora and other scientific journals became the marketplace where the promotion and trade of the associated specimens took place. This makes the Unio a complex case. Not only does this call into question the role of commerce in European scientific practice, but it shows how scientific authority was fashioned and negotiated in the German states during this period, forcing us to think more carefully about where, how, and by whom the sciences developed. Finally, it contributes to growing research on Germans as active agents in the wider European imperial enterprise before Germany had colonies of its own.