L’herborisation en Corse du naturaliste-explorateur Jacques-Julien Houtou de La Billardière au printemps 1788 et ses apports à la connaissance botanique de l’île

The naturalist and explorer Jacques-Julien Houtou de La Billardière (1755-1834) remains known for his participation in the d’Entrecasteaux expedition (1791-1794) in charge of finding La Pérouse and its ships missing in Oceania. This long journey in the southern hemisphere allowed him to discover many new species of flora and fauna, but also to carry out many ethnological observations. However, we must not forget his pioneering work in the eastern Mediterranean and Corsica carried out in 1787 and 1788 because they also focused on territories marked by rich floristic singularities. This contribution studies the context of this plant collection in Corsica carried out by La Billardière in the spring of 1788, for which some gray areas persisted, and the results of his botanical prospections. At the end of the 18th century, Corsica remains very little known from a floristic point of view and La Billardière played a pioneering role in the knowledge of this flora by discovering several original island plants, in particular new endemic species with Tyrrhenian distribution (Arenaria balearica L., Armeria pungens (Brot.) Hoffmanns. & Link, Borago pygmaea (DC.) Chater & Greuter, Castroviejoa frigida (Labill.) Galbany, L.Sáez & Benedí, Helleborus argutifolius Viv., Noccaea brevistyla (DC.) Steud., Solenopsis corsica (Meikle) M.B.Crespo, Serra & Juan, Stachys corsica Pers.).