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Romanian professor
The scientific work of the biologist cannot be characterized otherwise than prodigious. The scientist Traian Savulescu called him since 1945, "Princeps biologorum Romaniae" and making an initial assessment of his work, he asked a question that can get only one answer: "3000 types (species, varieties, forms and aberrations) discovered and described by Caradja. How many systematician naturalists worldwide, from Linne onwards, can be compared with Aristide Caradja in terms of studied material wealth and news added to knowledge? "
Moreover, the total studied materials count no less than 400,000 types of insects, including 125,000 specimens of micro-Lepidoptera (small butterflies), found now in the Museum of Natural History "Grigore Antipa" Bucureşti. However, at the beginning of its scientific work, the papers he presented were regarded with suspicion, since he was not a highly educated specialist. His family had forced him to attend the Faculty of Law, to which he had no attraction, but he obtained a law degree (he heard, as in parallel, the natural science courses too).
Beginning 1887, he arranged to Grumazesti (Neamt) a large park with a rich flora, a true laboratory for the study of insects. Inside the house there was a large library, a purpose on which he sacrificed all his inherited fortune. The entomologist without diploma, the highly qualified self-coached man organized or subsidized numerous expeditions around the world, from North Africa even to South America, from Tibet even in Spitzbergen archipelago, not to mention his exciting research from Romania and the whole European continent. His huge entomological collection, where micro-Lepidoptera predominated, area on which he became a world authority, gathered over decades. To this collection he designed ingenious preservation and preparation techniques. Only in the H. Hohne material shipped from China (1917-1923), A. Caradja identified 91 species new to science. Many entomologists honored him signing his name to insects discovered by them: Etimiu Aristidella, Caradjae Lambesia, etc.
At the same time, he rose far beyond the work of meticulousness and precision of zoo discoveries and quantifications. Based on the study of small butterflies, he formulated hypotheses and theories on evolution and migration of insects, species mutation mechanism, fauna-flora relations, climate of Earth's in the distant past and the old geographical configuration of some realms (he showed that Japan was once united to the Asian continent and Malakka peninsula was, on the contrary, separated). Many of his ideas were considered, as also Traian Savulescu underlined, "heretical" in their season, only to be confirmed as "prophetic" afterward. In 1930 he was elected as honorary member of the Romanian Academy. In 1937, in the fullness of his scientific maturity, he published a paper devoted to his conception on the world, in which he considered the most important issues of atom and cosmos.
This was Aristide Caradja, matchless entomologist, ingenious inventor, philosopher in the fullest sense of the word, as the biologist Constantin Motaş characterized him. But above all, he was a man with a deep sense of justice. The great geologist and scholar Ion Simionescu, admirable portrait creator, described him decades ago, in 1931, as featuring a broad forehead and a face with fine features, as tall and still straight, despite the burden of almost 70 years (he lived 95 years), as gentle and wise patriarch. He was also, like other Romanian scientists, a complete man, passionate not only about biology, but also about music, literature and thought.
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variant spelling:
CARADJA, ARISTIDE
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Curriculum vitae
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* 1861
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born
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1930
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Bucuresti
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Honorary member
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† 1955
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died
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