ARTEDI, PETER, a celebrated naturalist, was b. on the 22d of Feb., 1705, at Anund, in the province of Angermannland, Sweden. He was at first designed for the church, and entered the university of Upsala, intending to pursue the usual course of philosophy and theology; but he soon abandoned all thought of the ministry, and betook himself to medicine. In 1728, Lihmeus went to Upsala, to study the same science, and a close intimacy sprung up between the young men. They worked together, and, to a certain extent, on the principle of a division of labor. Physiology, chemistry, and mineralogy they pursued in common; but to this A. added ichthyology, and Linnteus ornithology mid entomology. In 1734, A. sailed for England, and Dimwits went to Lapland, each having made the other his heir and executor of all his scientific documents. While in London, A. wrote the preface to his Ichthyologia. Next year he went to Leyden in Holland, where he found Linnams just arrived from the north. Each showed the other the results of his labors. A.'s useful career was abruptly ended, on the 21st of Sept.,
1735, by his falling into one of the canals near Amsterdam.
A.'s only complete work is the Phitosophia Ichthuologica. The Synonyrno!ogica is described as a work of extraordinary labor, but somewhat confused. Linnwus faithfully performed his duty as his friend's executor. He arranged, corrected, and completed his manuscripts, awl, published the whole, together with a life of .the author, in 1738. According to envier, the great work of A. is the first named, which gave a truly scien tific character to the study of fishes. The only error of any magnitude which occurs in it is including the cetacem among fishes. A. was also a distinguished botanist. He was the first to indicate, as a special characteristic, the presence or absence of involucra in the umbelliferons plants, whose species are so difficult to distinguish from each other. Linnaeus has called a genus of these, in memory of his friend, artedia.