The First Marine Scientists A TIMELINE

Phoenicians By 2000 B.C. Phoenicians were sailing around the Mediterranean Sea, Red Sea, Eastern Atlantic Ocean, and the Indian Ocean observing the marine environment. Phoenicia is the name for the country & people living on the coast of Syria in ancient times at the east end of the Mediterranean Sea. It is believed that economic opportunity and population pressures forced them out into the seas to trade with the many peoples living along the Mediterranean Sea. The Phoenicians colonized many areas along the Mediterranean Sea and were considered far superior to all peoples of that time in seamanship.

By the time of the ancient Greeks a lot was known about organisms that live near the shore. In the fourth century B.C. Aristotle described many forms of marine life and recognized that gills are the breathing apparatus of fish. Aristotle is considered by many to be the 1st marine biologist. During the Dark Ages most scientific inquiry stopped and much of the knowledge gained by the ancient Greeks was lost.

(a Viking) led a party and discoveredVineland… In the 9th & 10th centuries the Vikings explored the Northern Atlantic. In 995 Leif Eriksson (a Viking) led a party and discoveredVineland… what we now call North America. In 1519 Magellan sailed around the globe; first to circumnavigate the globe. In 1492 Columbus rediscovered the New World.

In a series of three expeditions beginning in 1768, Cook explored all the oceans. Captain James Cook was the 1st to employ a full-time naturalist. In 1872 the Challenger Expedition began under the leadership of Captain George Nares. The Challenger and her crew sailed around the world collecting more information about the ocean than had been gathered in all previous human history. The expedition lasted 3.5 years.

By the 19th century vessels commonly took scientists along with them. The most famous of these scientists was Charles Darwin. He proposed the theory of evolution, and the formation of atolls. Darwin also studied plankton and barnacles. Specialists in barnacles still refer to Darwin’s work today. In 1831 Darwin sailed around the world on the HMS Beagle. The journey on the HMS Beagle took 5yrs through rough seas.