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      Figure 1.2. The biogeographic regions of Morrone (2015). Areas in yellow are part of the Holarctic kingdom: 1. Nearctic region; 2. Palearctic region. Areas in red are part of the Holotropical kingdom: 3. Neotropical region, 4. Ethiopian region, 5. Oriental region. Areas in blue are part of the Austral kingdom: 6. Andean region 7. Cape region, 8. Australian region, 9. Antarctic region. Areas in orange and purple are transition zones: 10. Mexican, 11. Saharo-Arabian, 12. Chinese, 13. Andean, 14. Indo-Malayan (Wallacea) (Escalante and Morrone 2020, p. 12, Figure 1.2) For a color version of this figure, see www.iste.co.uk/guilbert/biogeography.zip

The areas of Morrone (2015) serve a different purpose, namely to be able to study the relationships of these areas. In fact, Zimmermann’s and Morrone approaches are completely different methodologically, theoretically and historically; yet, both need a classification in order to be able to communicate their ideas to other plant and animal geographers. In other words, it is impossible to do animal and plant geography without a classification. Classifications, however, do not necessarily overlap as in the case of Zimmermann and Morrone. The classification of Zimmermann is based on the geographical regions of the world in the 18th century (note that Antarctica is missing in the former), while that of Morrone has its historical roots in both the zoogeographic Sclater–Wallacean and phytogeographic Humboldtian tradition. But where Zimmermann and Morrone do overlap is that they use the distributions of named species.

      One of the many benefits of doing plant and animal geographies, both in the 18th and 21st centuries, is that plant and animal distributions are available in the form of a database. Zimmermann had access to the many travelogues of explorers of his day such as James Cook, Louis Lahontan and Jan Struys, whereas Morrone had access to recent biogeographical classification (i.e. regionalizations) that had used publicly available digital distribution databases such as GBIF. Practically, these two approaches are the same. They are time and cost-effective (neither had to go into the field and collect and describe new species) and they are quick to access (both had access to libraries of one sort or another). Many plant and animal area classifications during the 18th and 19th were collated via the literature (e.g. Stromeyer 1800; Pritchard 1826). But what if you had the funds to go to an area that was poorly understood and under-collected? What if you had the funds to collect plant specimens and other data? How would you classify the natural history of an area? Alexander von Humboldt faced this problem during his journey to New Granada in present-day Colombia during the late 18th century and solved it in a most ingenious way.

      1.2.3. Botanical geography versus the geography of plants

The Essai sur la géographie des plantes (Humboldt and Bonpland [1805] 1807) and the 30 volume Le voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent, fait en 1799, 1800, 1801, 1802, 1803 et 1804 (Humboldt and Bonpland 1814–1829) were the result of a voyage that involved a phenomenal amount of collecting specimens and detailed observations and data collection of astronomical, geological and atmospheric phenomena. In fact, Humboldt amassed enough data to keep himself and Aimé Bonpland occupied until his death in 1859. The problem with collecting a large amount of data is synthesizing it into something useful. The 3,500 species descriptions that would take 15 years to complete was simply too long for someone to make a constructive classification of a fairly unknown area. Humboldt devised something new: a classification based on vegetation. Rather than divide an area based on species distributions, Humboldt used vegetation types, such as “(1) the scitaminales form (Musa, Pothos and Dracontium); (2) the palms; (3) the tree-ferns”, and justifies them:

      These divisions based on physiognomy have almost nothing in common with those made by botanists who have hitherto classified them according to very different principles. Only the outlines characterizing the aspect of vegetation and the similarities of impressions are used by the person contemplating nature, whereas descriptive botany [taxonomy] classifies plants according to the resemblance of their smallest but most essential parts […]. The absolute beauty of these shapes, their harmony, and the contrast arising from their being together, all this makes what is called the character of nature in various regions (Humboldt and Bonpland 2009, pp. 73–74).

      The notion that plant forms can be used to classify entire regions is central to Humboldtian plant geography. Without needing to know what the species are and to which taxonomic groups they belong, botanists can simply observe overall plant forms in order to classify the vegetation type. Compare this with another attempt at botanical geography using what Humboldt calls “very different principles”.

      In the same year, Augustin Pyramus de Candolle published the third edition of Flore Française (de Lamarck and de Candolle 1805), which was accompanied by an unusual map (Figure 1.3). The Carte Botanique de la France and a text explaining its function (de Candolle 1805) were “to show the general distribution of plants in France … The map should be considered more of an attempt to apply a specific methodology rather than an attempt to show the complete plant geography of France’’ (de

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