Carl Haussknecht, pharmacist and botanist, was born into a wealthy family in Bennungen, Germany. Completing pharmaceutical training in 1855, he became an assistant pharmacist and worked in Germany and Switzerland, where he made the acquaintance of several botanists. In Geneva, the botanist E. Boissier suggested that Haussknecht collect plants for him in the eastern Mediterranean countries. Before embarking on this expedition, Haussknecht returned to Breslau in Germany, where he passed the examination for his diploma in pharmacy in May 1964. He then set off for the Middle East, over the course of the next five years visiting Syria, Turkey, Armenia, Iraq and Iran, where he collected a significant number of natural history specimens. These travels were divided into two separate trips, to Syria and Turkey from 1864-1866 and then Iraq and Iran in 1866-1869.
After his return, Haussknecht was accorded the title of Professor by the Grand Duke of Saxony, in recognition of his exploratory efforts, and after spending 1873-1876 at the head of his own pharmacy, Haussknecht devoted himself to systematic botany. Settling in Weimar, Thuringia, he assembled a large personal herbarium and co-founded the Thuringian Botanical Society in 1882. His next expedition was undertaken in 1885, collecting in Greece with Theodor Heldreich, director of the Athens Botanical Garden. The results of this trip were published as "Symbolae ad floram graecam" in Mitteilungen des Thüringischen Botanischen Vereins. He was appointed a member of the Leopoldina Academy of Natural Sciences in 1889 and ennobled as Hofrat by the Grand Duke of Saxony.
Hausskneccht was particularly interested in the genus Epilobium, publishing a monograph on the subject in 1884 (Monographie der Gattung Epilobium). After his death Haussknecht's herbarium was overseen by the curator he had earlier appointed, J.F.N. Bornmüller, and after Bornmüller's death it was deposited at the University of Jena. Haussknecht left behind a wife and one daughter at his death in 1903. The genus Haussknechtia Boiss. is named in his honour.
Sources:
J.H. Barnhart, 1965, Biographical Notes Upon Botanists, 2: 140
A. Baytop, 2008, "The Turkish Plant Collections of Hofrat Prof. Carl Haussknecht (1893-1903)", Osmanh Bilimi Arastirmalari 9(1-2): 165-166
B. Hergt, 1903, Mitteilungen des Thüringischen Botanischen Vereins, 18: 1-20
F.K. Meyer, 1969, "Haussknecht, Carl", Neue Deutsche Biographie, 8: 128
G. Sayre, 1975, "Cryptogamae Exsiccatae: an annotated bibliography of exsiccatae of algae, lichens, hepaticae, and musci. V. Unpublished Exsiccatae: I. Collectors", Memoirs of the New York Botanical Garden, 19(3): 333-334.
