History
The Botanical Gardens of the University of Heidelberg were founded in 1593 as gardens for medicinal plants by Henricus SMETIUS, professor of medicine – 200 years after the foundation of the university. These first gardens were located outside the city walls - before the Markbronner Gate at the "Fauler Pelz". The location of the gardens changed various times throughout history. The first position of professorship in botany outside the department of medicine, was filled by Gottlieb Wilhelm BISCHOFF, who created the fifth gardens in 1834 and assigned Wilhelm Hofmeister as its director in 1834. He was succeeded by Ernst Pfitzer in 1872, during whose time the sixth gardens were created, which were the home to Pfitzer's valuable orchid collections.
The present seventh gardens located in the "Neuenheimer Feld" were created under Georg KLEBS and his chief horticulturist Erich BEHNICK and inaugurated in 1915. Towards the end of WW II bombings in the vicinity of the gardens led to a major loss of those collections.
The present collections – with emphasis on New and Old World succulents, neotropical orchids, and bromeliads – are the merit of the tireless collecting activities through countless expeditions of the recently deceased renowned Prof. Dr. Werner RAUH, director of the gardens during the years 1960–1982. Extensive publications based on the authority of Prof. RAUH and his former custodian Dr. SENGHAS allowed the Botanical Gardens of Heidelberg to gain worldwide reputation and to become a "crystallization center of botany"
While the total greenhouse area was able to be increased to 4,000 m², the garden grounds during the 70s unfortunately lost one fourth of its original 25 acres to the construction of new university institutes.
