Carl Alexander Clerck (1709–1765)
Born 1709 CE, died 1765 CE.
Carl Alexander Clerck (1709 – 22 July 1765) was a Swedish entomologist and arachnologist. Clerck came from a family in the petty nobility and entered the University of Uppsala in 1726. Little is known of his studies; although a contemporary of Linnaeus, it is unknown whether he had any contact with him during his time in Uppsala. His limited means forced him to leave university early and enter into government service, later ending up working in the administration of the City of Stockholm. His interest in natural history appears to have come at a more mature age, influenced by a lecture of Linnaeus he attended in Stockholm in 1739. In the following years he collected and categorized many spiders, published together with more general observations on the morphology and behaviour of spiders, in his Svenska Spindlar ("Swedish spiders", 1757, also known by its Latin subtitle, Aranei Suecici).
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