Pius Font i Quer

Pius Font i Quer (Lleida 1888 - Barcelona 1964) was a Catalan botanist, pharmacist and chemist.

He spent his childhood in Manresa (where there's a public high school with his name). He got his doctorate in pharmacy (1905) with his thesis about the Flora of Bages. He was professor on pharmacy and botany at Universitat de Barcelona and at Barcelonan Escola d'Agricultura.

He organized the Institut Botànic de Barcelona and founded Jardí Botànic in this city. In 1911 he joined the Health Military Corporation, in which he got the military rank of "tinent coronel farmacèutic". He was on a botanic expedition in Albarracín (Aragon) with his fellowship, when the Francisco Franco's 1936 "coup d'état" failed and began the Spanish Civil War. When he want back to Barcelona, he had to go through the war front; this is the reason he was accused of being a member of the military rebellion, resulting in him losing all his honours, which made continuation of his scientific work difficult.

He was president of the Institució Catalana d'Història Natural (1931-1934), member of the Institut d'Estudis Catalans in 1942 and of the Société Botanique at Geneve, honour vice president of the International Botany Congresses at Paris (1954) and Edinburgh (1964) and doctor "honoris causa" at the University of Montpellier.

Pius Font i Quer was the main creator of scientific botanical terminology in Catalan and Spanish. His most well-known works are: "Diccionario de Botánica" (1953), which is the reference work for botany students in Spain; "Plantas medicinales" (1961); and "Botánica pintoresca" (1958). His research took place in the whole Catalan countries, but specially in southern Land of Valencia and the Balearic Islands, mainly in Iviza and Formentera.

Some species and subspecies have been named in honour of Font i Quer and bear the species epithet "fontqueri".

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