Abstract
AbstractThe study of fungi posed challenges to the botanical activities at the scientific and sociable site of Bulstrode between 1763 and 1785. This article examines the mycological practices at Bulstrode as they appeared in letters, sketches and notes by John Lightfoot, Mary Delany, Georg Dionysius Ehret and Margaret Bentinck, duchess of Portland. I argue that the descriptive and analytical difficulties that fungi presented, and the flexibility and inconclusiveness of ephemeral productions, gave the botanists at Bulstrode opportunities to configure their own botanical identities, pursue their scientific ambitions and address the limitations of Linnaeus's sexual system of classification.
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