Ameghino, Florentino

Florentino Ameghino, (born Sept. 19, 1853, Moneglia, Kingdom of Sardinia—died Aug. 6, 1911, La Plata, Arg.), paleontologist, anthropologist, and geologist, whose fossil discoveries on the Argentine Pampas rank with those made in the western United States during the late 19th century.

Ameghino’s family immigrated to Argentina when he was a small child. He began collecting fossils as a youth and soon developed an interest in fossil classification. His first contributions were largely ignored by South American journals, but correspondence with French paleontologist and zoologist Paul Gervais, director of the Journal de Zoologie, led to international recognition. Altogether, he discovered more than 6,000 fossil species of extinct fauna. He was appointed professor of zoology at the University of Córdoba (1884) and professor of geology and mineralogy at La Plata National University (1887).

Although he spent three years in Europe, Ameghino remained isolated from the mainstream of scientific thought, which led him to misinterpret some of his fossil finds and to advance radical anthropological theories that drew severe criticism. He stated, in effect, that all mammals, including humans, originated on the Argentine pampas. He was dismissed from his teaching posts, and so clouded was his reputation that only near the end of his life did other paleontologists begin to realize the value of his work. He was director of the Museum of Natural History, Buenos Aires (1902–11), and was reappointed professor of geology at La Plata National University in 1906. Nearly 200 monographs and memoirs are contained in Obras completas y correspondencia científica de Florentino Ameghino, 24 vol. (1913–36; “Complete Works and Scientific Correspondence of Florentino Ameghino”).