Descriptions

This moss specimen was collected by Mr I H Burkill an Economic Botanist to the Botanical Survey of India and later Director of the Botanical Gardens in the Straits Settlements in Singapore.

It was collected December 1911 on the bark of a rotten branch lying on the ground out of which all the wood had decayed.

In 1911 the British Crown launched an expedition to punish Indian people in the Abor region near the Assam border for killing a British government official and his party (India was under British rule at this time). Several of the government’s scientific staff, including Burkill, accompanied the military to survey the land and its resources. It was called the Abor Expedition.

Burkill sent the specimens to HN Dixon for identification who published his findings in 1914 in the Records of the Botanical Survey of India Volume VI, 3. Dixon sent specimens to the Natural History Museum in London and the Botanic Gardens in Calcutta.

The 40 specimens at RAMM are in George Brook Savery’s (1874-1937) collection. He was a member of the Devonshire Association and had a particular interest in mosses, brambles and roses. A letter dated 27 August 1912 from Burkill to Savery gives details of where the specimens were collected. We can assume that the moss specimens were sent to Savery from Burkill.



This object is not on display.