Dutch physician and botanist in Utrecht. Evert Jacob van Wachendorff studied medicine at Leiden and Utrecht and received his doctorate in 1724. Two years later he became both a lecturer in chemistry at the university and the municipal physician to Utrecht. Later to be named professor of medicine, chemistry and botany (1743) he continued to work in both capacities until his death. The most important work he produced was entitled Horti ultrajectini index (1747). It listed a great deal of species which he had cultivated in the small botanic garden at Utrecht, a garden he greatly developed while at the university. This work followed the Linnaean tradition when it came to genera and species, but the higher level classification was unique and wholly his own creation. Using long and complicated Greek-derived names, Wachendorff created 19 classes using combinations of characteristics present in fruits, seeds and flowers. Attempting to produce a natural system his groupings are, in the most part, quite unnatural. He did, however, split these classes into 'orders' which largely agree with present-day family groups. The journal Wachendorffia was named in his honour, as was the genus Wachendorfia J. Burman.

Sources:
F.A. Stafleu, 1971, Linnaeus and the Linnaeans
F.A. Stafleu and R.S. Cowan, 1976-1998, Taxonomic Literature, 2nd edition (TL-2).