AASP Primary Records Program

We regret to announce that our friend

Professor Gunnar Erdtman

died on February 18th, 1973

Members of the Palynological Laboratory, Sweden

IN MEMORIAM   O. GUNNAR E. ERDTMAN
1897-1973

With Gunnar Erdtman's death the pioneer generation in pollen analysis has died out. He was the last of the young scientists who were attracted by the vistas opened by von Post in his Oslo lecture in 1916 By that time, of course pollen-analytic work had been going on for some time, and even if von Post then a young state geologist, had no liabilities and few facilities for academic teaching, he attracted colleagues who adopted his methods and who published partly pollen-analytic papers even before von Post's own lecture was published - it was delayed till 1918. Ragnar Sandegren's Hornborgasjo monograph was dated 1916, and in 1917 Bertil Halden and Uno Sundelin published their theses. Another group to whom Erdtman belonged, came a few years later: Erik Granlund 1924, Gosta Lundquist 1920, Carl Malmstrom 1923 and Gunnar Booberg 1924, even if the two last mentioned did not really belong to the mainstream of pollen analysis.

Granlund's premature death interrupted one of the promising careers in the field. Some of the scientists mentioned above continued to use pollen analysis as an instrument in investigations of other problems, chiefly geological. Others left the field

The exception, the man who became the real pollen analyst, was Gunnar Erdtman. He was an exception in two ways. First, he came to pollen analysis as a botanist. As academic teachers he reckoned the two botanists at Stockholm University (Stockholms Hogskola) at that time: Gustaf Lagerhein and Otto Rosenberg. Very characteristically, his first paper was entitled, "Some geobotanical results of ... ". His starting point was different from that of the geologists, his way of looking at problems was different. Unfortunately, this, which should have been advantage both to himself and to the pollen analysis group, had little effect for reasons to he mentioned below.

The other way in which Erdtman differed from the rest of the group was his international outlook. As I have written elsewhere, Von Post very rarely condescended to write in anything but Swedish, and none of the papers mentioned above were written in other languages. Von Post and Sundelin had published a paper each in German in 1916 and 1917, but, pollen-analytically speaking, they were not particularly important. Erdtman's thesis of 1921 was the first major pollen-analytic paper to be published in a world language.

The effect was interesting. In or before 1921 pollen-analytic papers had been published in Denmark (Jessen 1920), Finland (Auer 1921), and Norway (Holmsen 1920): the three Nordic countries, and with the exception of Auer's papers all published in Nordic languages. Then the explosion came: Austria (Firbas 1923) Czechoslavakia (Rudolf and Firbas 1922), Estonia (Thompson 1925), Germany (Stark 1923, Bertsch 1924), Latvia (Galenieks 1925), Poland (Szafer 1926), USSR (Gerazimov, Kudrachov 1925, Dokturovsky 1925), and Switzerland (Spinner 1925, Keller 1926). In the 5 years after the publication of Erdtman's thesis pollen analysis spread to all Europe, being taken up by indigenous scientists except in France and England, where Erdtman himself was responsible for the papers published during this period. For after having completed his first research in Sweden, he extended his area to the whole of northwestern Europe, and during the following years submitted palynological data from Norway and New Zealand in addition to the countries mentioned. No wonder that in wide circles he was considered as <>, shadowing out the more distant figure of the Grand Master himself.

Everything pointed to Erdtman becoming the crown prince of pollen analysis, taking up and continuing where von Post would have to leave. This never came about. There is no reason to ask why, whose fault it was, and which were the outward events leading to the split. It is the sad story of two strong personalities who proved to be incompatible. And the academic world being like it is everywhere, Gunnar Erdtman had to be the loser. Being cut off from the only laboratory where he should have been, he was doubly exiled from Academe to school teaching and also from the scientific centres of Stockholm-Uppsala. After various short-time school appointments and after a year on a Rockefeller scholarship in Canada, he was in 1930 appointed to a school position in Visby, which he held until 1935. As everybody knows, Visby is a beautiful place, especially in the summer, but scientifically it is dead. Even though Swedish school teachers with an academic degree at that time had a light teaching load, it speaks highly for Erdtman's devotion to his science and for his determination of mind that he did not slip into hourgeois routine life, but managed to keep up scientific work, and during the years that he lived in Visby published a great number of papers, some of them attacking new and original problems. The support he received at that time -financial and other- was negligible.

In 1935 he moved to another school teaching position, this time in Västerås no too far from the capital, but the decisive difference became when he was appointed (1944) to a large, modern school in a new suburb to Stockholm itself. Gradually the authorities realized the stupidity of keeping him at the school bench; he was relieved of his teaching duties and could establish a small pollen-analytic laboratory at the school. Later, the Swedish Research Council took the full step and financed the well know, at that time independent palynological laboratory which under Erdtman's directorship moved from Bromma to Solna and which has now ended up with the Stockholm University at Lilla Frescati.

Gunnar Erdtman was made a titular Professor in 1954. He received a large number of academic honours, and the Indian Palynological Society has founded a medal named after him.

Erdtman's earliest papers were pollen-analytic studies in the style that later became a classic: investigation of the vegetation development of an area as a basis also for deductions about geological and historical events. After his thesis in 1921 he never published another major work in this line. His working condition may have contributed to that. But a great number of smaller papers of the same kind came out in the following years, many of them, as already indicated, dealing with similar problems in other countries.

Two important papers should be mentioned from his pollen-analytic period. In 1943 he published a small paper, partly dealing with the pollen flora of dry-land humus. Unfortunately, the humus cam from subarctic areas and was therefore slightly anomalous. Neither Erdtman himself no anybody else at that time fully realized the inherent possibility of this attack, the direct continuation of which is the forest bottom pollen analysis of today. At that time the theoretical concepts and also our knowledge of the morphology of pollen grains were hardly sufficiently developed for dealing with this type of deposit. In his last handbook Erdtman could utilize his old analyses of more than 25 years ago in a new context in the light of what had happened in the meantime.

If this paper in a kind of way and for the time being proved to be a blind alley the other one had an immediate and lasting effect on pollen analysis: the introduction of the acetolysis method in 1934, based upon a paper he published together with his brother the year before. In classical pollen analysis, samples were simply boiled with KOH, and put under the microscope, By sieving one might get rid of coarser particles, but the KOH treatment in itself served primarily for deflocculation. The dissolution and consequent removal of unsaturated colloids was of importance in highly humified deposits, but quantitatively it did not mean very much in ordinary samples. Many methods were tried for concentrating the pollen grains: mechanical ones based on desnity differences, or differential staining to make pollen grains more easily recognizable so that one could search under low magnification. Assarson and Granlund had introduced the HF treatment in 1924 to get rid of fine-grained mineral particles. However, in the most troublesome deposits: the slightly humified Sphagnum peats, none of these methods were of any help, and the Canadian material he brought back was exceptionally troublesome in that respect. Erdtman demonstrated the obvious way of dissolving the cellulose which constitutes the bulk of such samples. And the method, practically in the form in which it was originally proposed, has been a standard ever since. In most types of deposits it has cut analysis time by a very large fraction. In addition, it has had the great advantage of giving a clearer picture of the morphology of the pollen grain.

Erdtman's continued scientific work developed in other directions, but before dealing with that one should not forget his running bibliography published every second year or each year in Geologiska Föreningens i Stockholm Föhandlingar under the title <> (later <<… on palynology>>). The first one, covering the literature before 1927, was published the same year. The last regular one came in Grana Palynologica 1957, but by that time the task had become too much for himself and his group, at any rate without a major reorganization. And also the excellent bibliographies published by Madame Van Campo, later as supplements to this journal, obviated the need for continued efforts.

Another, very important initiative was Grana Palynologica. Originally, this was a reprint series from Erdtman's institute, starting in 1948. Considering the nature of the institute at that time, the series naturally had to consist chiefly of his own papers. In 1954, a more formal periodical was instituted, still mainly consisting of reprints, but soon Grana Palynologica developed into an independent periodical. One of the reasons for this development may have been that Erdtman's own researches and those of his institute took a direction that made the usual periodicals less suitable for their publication.

Notwithstanding his contributions to other fields of palynology, Erdtman will always be remembered as the pollen morphologist. As a matter of fact, he was the first pollen analyst to publish pictures of pollen grains, as far back as in 1923: a small thing with 93 pollen pictures which for many years was a bible for young inexperienced analysts.

The intricate details of exine morphology very soon attracted his interest, and supporting himself on Fischer's for its time remarkably accurate descriptions he systematized the morphological terminology. He had the artist's perception of forms, which certainly was important in the understanding of the pictures. At that time there was only the optical microscope to work with, I don't think he ever was quite confident with phase contrast illumination, nor was he enthusiastic over the use of regular stains. And at any rate one had to stretch one's observational power to the extreme, and sometimes a little beyond (we all did that!) to perceive the necessary features. But imaginative interpretations are ephemeral if not based upon a thorough knowledge of the matter, and Erdtman certainly had a full command of that. I have differed from Erdtman, and still differ, with regard to the interpretation of certain details, but this should not and must not overshadow his great achievements in the days of optical pollen morphology. Erdtman is responsible for more terms in pollen morphology than perhaps the rest of us put together. This is also an indication of his constant probing into this difficult matter, all the time trying to arrive at a higher clarification of concepts.

Erdtman was very much intrigued by the possibilities of ultra-violet microscopy, and it was a constant annoyance to him that he could not persuade pollen morphologists to use this approach. When electron microscopy was introduced he very early took up the technique in his laboratory, even if he himself did not publish the material, only sometimes appearing as a co-author. And the important papers which first demonstrated the lamellar structure of the exine (exospore) came from Erdtman's laboratory and largely under his guidance. Also, a number of larger palynological monographs dealing with the pollen morphology of various families were published by students who came to his laboratory from all parts of the world.

The book that in many ways marks a turning point in Erdtman's scientific development came in 1943: <>. It was still under the influence of the classical concepts: pollen-analytic technique occupies a great deal of it, but even in this manifest in the next handbook: <>, which came in 1952, later followed by volumes about other major taxa. What a difference since the little pollen atlas he published in 1923! Being both almost pedantically meticulous and a good artist in his own right, Erdtman was able to guide the work of his artist collaborator in such a manner as to fully justify his proud words in the preface about the value of the illustrations.

In 1969 came the "Handbook of palynology." This, again, has a broader outlook, dealing with other palynological objects than just pollen, dealing also with various other theoretical and practical aspects of palynology, including a few pages on pollen analysis in the classical sense. For this book Erdtman could draw upon the collected great expertise of his institute; various technical chapters were written by his collaborators.

Out of this system of handbooks grew his last great venture: The World Pollen and Spore Flora, a very ambitious scheme of which he himself only saw a small beginning being realized. Hopefully, it came as a satisfaction that the continuation of the flora is safeguarded at any rate for the nearest future.

Erdtman maintained his international outlook throughout his career. He was a great traveller, and visited every part of the world, all the time collecting pollen samples for his institute. He also got permission from the curators of the great herbaria to collect samples of rare, often unique specimens, with the result that his institute maintains an unsurpassed and unsurpassable pollen (and spore) collection. No wonder that the institute, well equipped and with such collections as a basis, became a Mecca for palynologists from all over the world. But in contrast to its namesake this was an open Mecca to which everybody had access and were welcome, whatever their palynological belief.

Behind a very dignifid exterior and reserved manners, Gunnar Erdtman had a deep sense of humour which only rarely came to the surface. Black humour was not invented for his generation, but I am not quite certain that the idea was foreign to him. He had a deep love of poetry with Shelley as his favourite, and the family artistic talent (his father was a renowned painter) persisted also in him. He was a fine artist, both on the flute and on paper. Some of his books carry one or two of his remarkable drawings -those who have been received in his home have seen more there, many of them produced during idle hours as an air raid warden during World War II.

A small episode from his period with von Post in many ways illustrates that light-veined side of his character which was often overlooked by people who did not know him too well: a distinctive pollen grain turned up in one analysis series after the other, but defied all attempts at identification. So one day von Post got a mysterious anonymous telegram identifying it as Myriophyllum alterniflorum. The sender in the end proved to be Erdtman.

Knut Faegri
Botanical Museum, University of Bergen.

Some of the information contained herein I have received from Mrs. Gunni Erdtman, who was her husband's constant companion, and to whom this note is respectfully dedicated.