FORBES, EDWARD. – English naturalist, born in Douglas on 12 February 1815, died in London on 23 November 1854. He was the pioneer of marine exploration with the dredge and of the biogeography of the sea (zoogeographical maps).
F. maintained the constancy and immutability of species. For him, “varieties” are temporary and not incipient species: “every true species displays in its individuals certain specific characteristic traits that distinguish it from every other, as though the Creator had impressed a particular seal or mark upon each type.”
BIBL.: Works: A history of british mollusca and their shells, 4 vols., London 1853. Biographies: H. A. Nicholson, Lives and labours of leading naturalists, London 1890, pp. 192–222; Dict. of national biography, VII, 1 (1908), p. 392 ff., with a list of the publications. Luigi Scramin