Christian Konrad Sprengel

Christian Konrad Sprengel
Cover page of Sprengel's landmark book (1793)
Born	22 September 1750 Brandenburg an der Havel
Died	7 April 1816 (1816-04-08) (aged 65) Berlin
Nationality	German
Alma mater	University of Halle-Wittenberg
Known for	plant sexuality
Scientific career
Fields	natural history

Christian Konrad Sprengel (22 September 1750 – 7 April 1816) was a German naturalist, theologist, and teacher. He is most famous for his research on plant sexuality. Sprengel was the first to recognize that the function of flowers was to attract insects, and that nature favoured cross-pollination. Along with the work of Joseph Gottlieb Kölreuter he set the foundations for the modern study of floral biology and anthecology, but his work was not widely recognized until Charles Darwin examined and confirmed several of his observations almost 50 years later; see Fertilisation of Orchids (1862).