Peter Forskal, a Swedish traveller and naturalist, born in Kalmar in 1736, died in Yerim, Arabia, July 11, 1763. He studied at Gottin-gen and at Upsal, published a thesis in opposition to the then dominant philosophy of Wolf, and incurred the displeasure of government by a treatise on civil liberty. He was appointed to a professorship in the university of Copenhagen, and by recommendation of Linnaeus was attached with Karsten Niebuhr to the scientific expedition sent to Egypt and Arabia by the king of Denmark. He set out in 1761, and during two years preceding his death by the plague collected materials for three important works descriptive of the fauna and flora of the East, which were published under the editorial care of Niebuhr.