"Founded in 1635, the Royal Garden of Medicinal Plants became the National Museum of Natural History during the French Revolution, with magisterial chairs which were suppressed in 1985. During this 350-year period more than 500 scientists, men and women, worked in these two successive institutions. Although some of them like Buffon, Cuvier and Claude Bernard recall something to the common layman, most of these figures are presently unknown out of a restricted set of specialists. The lives and works of these scientists of the Royal Garden and of the Museum were therefore worth of report in a biographical dictionary which includes not less than 516 entries. These men and women with quite diverse social origins, training and characters explored all aspects of physical, natural and human sciences. They widened the field of knowledge, gave rise to new disciplines and institutions, assembled collections, and contributed to the spread of knowledge. Some of them were in parallel appointed civil or military officers, sometimes very close to the French central government. Either scientists with cabinets or great travellers, distinguished persons or unpretentious civil servants, all played a role in the history of the great institution they served."

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