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{{Short description|Scottish physician and botanist}}
{{Other uses|George Watt (disambiguation)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2017}}
{{Use British English|date=March 2017}}
[[File:George_Watt_RBGE.jpg|thumb|A portrait from the archives of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh]]
Sir '''George Watt''' {{postnominals|country=GBR|CIE|FLS}} (24 April 1851 – 2 April 1930) was a Scottish physician and botanist who worked in India as "Reporter" on economic botany and during the course of his career in India he compiled a major multivolume work, ''The'' ''Dictionary of Economic Products of India'', the last volume of which was published in 1893. An abridged edition of his work was also published as the single volume ''Commercial Products of India'' in 1908. He is honoured in the binomials of several plants named after him.

==Life and career==
Watt was born in [[Old Meldrum]], Aberdeenshire, Scotland, the third son of John Watt. He was educated at Grammar School, King's College and [[Marischal College|Marischal College, Aberdeen]], and later attended both the [[University of Aberdeen]] and the [[University of Glasgow]]. He received the degrees of [[Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery|M.B.]] and [[Doctor of Medicine|C.M.]] in 1873. He enjoyed teaching and joined the University of Glasgow as a prodissector to the Professor of Anatomy. Around 1864, there was a famine in Orissa and the then Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, Sir [[George Campbell (1824–1892)|George Campbell]] was firm that agricultural education was key to avoiding similar disasters and following the recommendations of Sir [[John Strachey (civil servant)|John Strachey]]'s Famine Commission, a need to carry out scientific study to improve the food supply in India was noted. In order to fulfil this requirement, and on the recommendation of [[Joseph Dalton Hooker|J.D. Hooker]], he was selected for the post Professor of Botany, at Presidency College, Calcutta University and joined there in 1873–74.<ref name="IndianBio">{{cite IBD1915|wstitle= Watt, Sir George |volume= 24.1 |page= 460 |year=1915|short=}}</ref> He taught for ten years at a college in Hoogly and at the same time began to study the local botany and began to form a private herbarium. He followed a system of numbering specimens in the field with numbered tag labels detached from similarly numbered sheets in the field to avoid mistakes in labelling. In 1879 he travelled around northwest Punjab and he described several new plant species from the [[Chamba, Himachal Pradesh|Chamba]] region.<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1111/j.1095-8339.1881.tb01260.x|title=Notes on the Vegetation &c. Of Chumba State and British Lahoul; with Descriptions of New Species|journal=Journal of the Linnean Society of London, Botany|volume=18|issue=111|pages=368–382|year=1881|last1=Watt|first1=George|url=https://zenodo.org/record/1447496}}</ref> In 1881 he was posted as surgeon to the Burma-Manipur Delimitation Commission with special permission to conduct botanical studies during the expedition. On his return he was made in charge of the [[Calcutta International Exhibition]] for 1883–84. Watt organized a 1700-page catalogue for the economic section of the exhibition that was in charge of. Towards the end of the exhibition, the government suggested that the catalogue should be expanded. The expanded version was ready for the [[Colonial and Indian Exhibition]] of London in 1886. This was later to become the first volume of his work and he was made a CIE for his work. On his return to India, he was put in charge of the Indian Museum and appointed Reporter on Economic Products under the Department of Revenue and Agriculture. [[Isaac Henry Burkill]] worked as an assistant reporter. He organized another exhibition for the Delhi Exhibition of Indian Art on 2 January 1902 and published ''Indian Art at Delhi''.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/indianartatdelhi00indiuoft|title=Indian art at Delhi, 1903|publisher=Government Press|year=1903|author=Watt, Sir George|place=Calcutta}}</ref> Watt edited the ''Agricultural Ledger'', a government bulletin that collated notes on agricultural products and practices sent by officers posted across India. As an economic botanist, he also published books on cotton<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/wildcultivatedco00watt|title=The wild and cultivated cotton plants of the world. A revision of the genus Gossypium.|publisher=Longmans, Green, and Co.|year=1907|place=London|author=Watt, Sir George}}</ref> and cacao.<ref name=kew />
[[File:Commercial products watt.jpg|thumb|left|Title page of the 1908 ''Commercial Products of India''|alt=Title page of the abridged version of 1908|238x238px]]
During the course of his career in India the positions he was appointed to included special duty in connection with Burma-Manipur Boundary Commission as Medical Officer, 1882; Scientific Assistant Secretary, Government of India, 1881; in charge of the India Section of the Calcutta International Exhibition, 1884; Commissioner, Colonial and Indian Exhibition, London, 1885–86; Reporter to Government of India on Economic Products, 1887–1903; Governor of Imperial Institute, 1892; Editor, The Agricultural Ledger, 1892–1903; President, Pharmacological Section of the Indian Medical Congress, 1894; in charge of Calcutta Industrial Museum, 1894–03; Honorary Secretary, Indigenous Drug Committee of India, 1901; Director, Indian Art Exhibition, Delhi, 1903.<ref name="IndianBio" />

Aside from work, Watt also took an interest in missionary work in India. In 1873 he married Jane, daughter of Robert Simmie, a customs officer at [[Lossiemouth]]. They had a son and two daughters.<ref>{{cite news|newspaper=The Glasgow Herald |date= 3 April 1930|page=11| title=Sir George Watt. Death of a notable Scotsman.}}</ref>

==Retirement ==
He retired in 1906 and settled in [[Lockerbie, Scotland]]. For five years he lectured on Indian trees to forestry students at Edinburgh University. He also published a taxonomic work on the ''Primulas of India''. In 1912 he made a trip to the island of [[São Tomé]]. In Lockerbie, he served as a County Councillor and as a Justice of Peace. He helped in developing the gardens of the [[The Crichton|Crichton Royal Institution]] at Dumfries. He died at his home in Lockerbie on 2 April 1930.<ref name=kew>{{cite journal|author=Burkill, I.H.|author-link=Isaac Henry Burkill| journal=Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information (Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew)| volume=1930|year=1930| issue=7| pages=327–336| jstor=4107653| title=[Obituary] }}</ref>

==Publications ==
[[File:Dictionary of Economic Products.jpg|thumb|Title page of the first volume]]
Watt's first work on the catalogue of the exhibits at the Calcutta International Exhibition was published in 1883 and consisted of four volumes with seven parts in them. The exhibits themselves had been organized by [[Troilokyanath Mukhopadhyay|Trailokhya Nath Mukharji]], a civil servant who later served as a curator of the economic section at the Indian Museum. He was assisted by botanists as well as Indian physicians with a knowledge of medicinal plants including Dr [[Moodeen Sheriff]] of Madras, [[Kanny Lall Dey]] of Calcutta and Dr [[Udoy Chand Dutt]] of Serampore.
* [https://archive.org/stream/economicproduct03wattgoog#page/n5/mode/2up Volume I.] which included:
** Part I. Gums and Resins.
** Part II. Dyes, Tans, and Mordants.
** Part III. Fibers and Fibre-yielding plants.
** Part IV. Oils and Oil seeds, Perfumery, and Soaps. Index.
* [https://archive.org/stream/economicproduct00wattgoog#page/n5/mode/2up Part V. Medicinal Products]
* [https://archive.org/stream/economicproduct05wattgoog#page/n5/mode/2up Part VI. Foods, Food-stuffs, and Fodders]
* [https://archive.org/stream/economicproduct03wattgoog#page/n5/mode/2up Part VII. Timbers]
This was developed further into Watt's ''Dictionary of the Economic Products of India'' published from 1889 to 1893 and projected to be in six volumes but it grew larger and the additions were accommodated by breaking up the last volume into four parts. It is considered by many as the greatest compilation of the commercial plants (and natural products) of [[India]]. Although there were similar subsequent works like the ''Wealth of India'' series, Watt's work continues to be a major source for research.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Watt's Dictionary: A Landmark in the Study of the Economic Plants of India| author=Chakravarthy, R.S.| journal=Economic Botany |volume=29| issue=1 |year=1975| pages=31–38| jstor=4253561 | doi=10.1007/bf02861253| s2cid=12513}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=The Wealth of India - a CSIR's encyclopaedia of information resource on economic plants, animals and minerals| author=Chakre, Onkar J. | journal=Current Science| volume=99| issue=7| year=2010| pages=969–971|url=http://www.currentscience.ac.in/Downloads/article_id_099_07_0969_0971_0.pdf}}</ref> Watt's compilation included descriptions of other natural products such as silk, oysters and minerals.
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia1 Volume I. Abaca to Buxus (1889)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia2 Volume II. Cabbage to Cyperus (1890)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia3 Volume III. Dacrydium to Gordonia (1890)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia4 Volume IV. Gossypium to Linociera (1890)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia5 Volume V. Linum to Oyster (1891)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia61 Volume VI. Part 1. Pachyrhizus to Rye (1892)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia62 Volume VI. Part 2. Sabadilla to Silica (1893)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia63 Volume VI. Part 3. Silk to Tea (1893)]
* [https://archive.org/details/DictionaryOfTheEconomicProductsOfIndia64 Volume VI. Part 4. Tectona to Zygophillum and Index (1893)]
Watt's assistant [[Isaac Henry Burkill|I.H. Burkill]], who moved to the Straits Settlement published ''A dictionary of the economic products of the Malay Peninsula'' in two volumes in 1935. It was broadly modelled on the lines of Watt's work.<ref>{{cite journal|title= Reviewed Work: A Dictionary of the Economic Products of the Malay Peninsula by I. H. Burkill, W. Birtwistle, F. W. Foxworthy, J. B. Scrivenor, J. G. Watson, I. H. Burkhill| author=C.F.S.| journal= Empire Forestry Journal| volume=15| issue=1| year= 1936| pages=139–141 | jstor=42592785 }}</ref>

Watt made a study of tea cultivation in Assam and Kangra and published a report of the pests and diseases affecting it in 1898.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Pests and Blights of the Tea Plant: Being a Report of Investigations conducted in Assam and to some extent also in Kangra| author=Watt, George| year=1898| publisher=Government of India| place= Calcutta |url=https://archive.org/details/pestsandblights00wattgoog}}</ref>

==Awards and honours==
Watt won the [[Daniel Hanbury]] Gold medal in 1901, and was [[Knight Bachelor|knighted]] in the [[1903 Durbar Honours]].<ref name="IndianBio" /><ref>{{Cite newspaper The Times |title=The Durbar Honours |date=1 January 1903 |page=8 |issue=36966}}</ref> He was also an [[Ordre des Palmes Académiques|Officier d'Academe]]; Corresponding Member of the Royal Horticultural Society: Fellow of the Royal Society, Haarlem; and President of the Richmond Athenæum, 1907.<ref name="IndianBio" />

A rhododendron (''[[Rhododendron wattii]]'') was named after him by [[John Macqueen Cowan|Cowan]] and an iris (''[[Iris wattii]]'') was named after him by [[Joseph Dalton Hooker]]. ''Eranthemum wattii'' (originally ''Daedalacanthus wattii'') was described and named after him by [[Richard Henry Beddome|R. H. Beddome]]. Other plants named after him include ''[[Clematis wattii]]'' and ''[[Primula wattii]]''.

{{botanist|G.Watt}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
{{wikisource|works=or}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=George Watt |birth=1851 |death=1930 |sopt=t}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050210204421/http://taa.org.uk/TAAScotland/TAAPAPE.htm TAA Scottish Branch Meeting at CTVM]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060206030612/http://people.aapt.net.au/wildog/rhodotree.html Tree Rhododendrons]
* [http://stories.rbge.org.uk/archives/11686 Sir George Watt (1851-1930)]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Watt, George}}
[[Category:1851 births]]
[[Category:1930 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century Scottish botanists]]
[[Category:20th-century Scottish botanists]]
[[Category:Alumni of the University of Aberdeen]]
[[Category:Alumni of the University of Glasgow]]
[[Category:Academic staff of the University of Calcutta]]
[[Category:People from Oldmeldrum]]
[[Category:People educated at Aberdeen Grammar School]]
[[Category:Scottish knights]]
[[Category:Fellows of the Linnean Society of London]]
[[Category:Scottish journalists]]
[[Category:Scottish editors]]

George Watt (botanist) - Revision history

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