MADBRYO

The herbarium housed in the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle (MNHN) in Paris, France is composed of two entities, identified in Index Herbariorum by the acronyms P and PC. They correspond, respectively, to vascular plants (angiosperms, gymnosperms, ferns and lycophytes) and to the cryptogamic organisms (bryophytes, algae, fungi including lichens). The bryophytes collection is thus in PC. This collection includes more than 900,000 specimens and it is constituted of numerous specific herbaria (personal collections) and of a general herbarium.

Bryological material collected in Madagascar is very well represented in PC, because of the colonial history of France. The MNHN has good records of the past biodiversity for territories that were under French colonial rule.
Numerous soldiers, administrators and clerics donated their collections from Madagascar to the MNHN. Earlier studies on Malagasy mosses were mainly conducted by French bryologists :

• Renauld, F. (1897) Prodrome de la flore bryologique de Madagascar, Mascareignes et des Comores (ed. Monaco)
  
• Renauld, F. and Cardot, J. (1895) Histoire naturelle des plantes mousses in Histoire physique, Naturelle et politique de Madagascar (ed. Grandidier)

Specimens of Humbert, Perrier de la Bathie, Decary, Heim and Tixier are also deposited in PC.