Adansonia
48 (19) - Pages 205-226Gardener-botanists played a decisive role in the development of the living plant collections and herbaria of the National Museum of Natural History (Paris), but their place remained unknown for a long time. Paul-François Lasalle (1771-1809) was one of these behind-the-scenes figures at the Paris Museum. A student of André Thouin, the famous head gardener of the Jardin des Plantes, Lasalle held the position of head gardener of the botanical garden of the École centrale de Fontainebleau at the end of the 18th century. Then, in 1803, Thouin sent him to Corsica to take care of the Ajaccio Botanical Garden, which had been created a few years earlier. He remained there only a few years, dying of malaria in December 1809. Completely forgotten for more than two centuries, the botanical work of Lasalle deserves to be brought to light because his observations made in Corsica at the very beginning of the 19th century allowed the island flora to be enriched with several rare species (Kundmannia sicula, Prasium majus, Ranunculus macrophyllus), including two remarkable Cyrno-Sardinian endemic species characterized by a micro-insular distribution (Nananthea perpusilla and Silene velutina) which he was the first to discover.