Georg zu Münster

Count Georg Ludwig Friedrich Wilhelm zu Münster was a German paleontologist.

Biography

Münster was born on 17 February 1776 in Langelage, near Osnabrück. In 1800, he reportedly became a Prussian official in the principalities of Brandenburg-Ansbach and Brandenburg-Bayreuth. He assembled a renowned fossil collection, which was eventually acquired by the Bavarian state and became the foundation of the palaeontological museum in Munich.
Münster assisted Georg August Goldfuss in writing his great work, Petrefacta Germaniae.
Louis Agassiz and Georges Cuvier are said to have visited him at Bayreuth, where he reportedly donated part of his collection to them. He died in Bayreuth on 23 December 1844.
The Graf-Münster-Gymnasium in Bayreuth, the city's largest school, was founded in 1833 and named in his honour.