Named for Carl Peter (Pehr or Per) Thunberg (1743–1828), doctor, botanist and student of Linnaeus, who collected plants in Japan, Sri Lanka and South Africa. He took his degree in natural philosophy and medicine at Uppsala University in 1767, where he was a pupil of Carl Linnaeus; moving to Paris in 1770 to continue his studies. In 1771, he joined the Dutch East India Company and sailed as the ship’s surgeon to Cape Town. He spent three years there learning Dutch, making three expeditions into the interior, during which he collected 3,000 plants, 1,000 of which were new to science. He sailed to Java in 1775 and thence to Dejima, Japan, the small island trading-post occupied by the Dutch and connected to the city of Nagasaki by a small bridge. He was able to travel inland, where he collected many plants. In 1776, he returned to Sweden via Sri Lanka, where he also made collecting trips. He was appointed botanical demonstrator at Uppsala in 1777 and professor of medicine and natural philosophy around 1781. He published Flora Japonica (1784), Prodromus plantarum capensium (2 vols, 1794, 1800), Icones plantarum japonicarum (1805), Flora capensis (1807–23) on the South African collections, and Voyages de CP Thunberg au Japon par le Cap de Bonne-Espérance, les Isles de la Sonde (1796) about his travels. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in April 1788.

Active principle, especially bulbs: imperialine and other steroid alkaloids, tuliposide A, tulipalin A

Class II. Moderately hazardous: similar modes of action as aconitine, symptoms include vomiting, spasms, disturbances of GI tract and kidneys, hypotension, cardiac arrest.