Adolphe Jules César Auguste Dureau de la Malle (3 March 1777 – 17 May 1857) was a Frenchgeographer,naturalist, historian and artist. He was the son of the scholar and translatorJean-Baptiste Dureau de la Malle and mother fromSaint-Domingue.^[1]

Dureau de la Malle published a number of works on the economy andtopography of the classic countries, i.e. Italy andCarthage at the time of theRoman Empire:

• On the population in ancient Italy (De la Population de l'Italie ancienne) (1825)
• On agriculture, administration and units of measurement of the Romans (De l'Agriculture, de l'Administration, des Poids et Mesures des Romains) (1827–1828)
• On the topography of Carthage (De la Topographie de Carthage) (1835).

As a naturalist, he published on the origins of the cereal crops.

• De l'Origine et de la patrie des Céréales (1819 et 1826)

and, his most significant work, on vegetationsuccession.

• Mémoire sur l'alternance ou sur ce problème: la succession alternative dans la reproduction des espèces végétales vivant en société, est-elle une loi générale de la nature. Annales des sciences naturelles, 15 (1825): 353–381. Rendered in English: Memoir on alternation or on alternative succession in the reproduction of plant species living in a community – is it a general law of nature?

Here he present results of his observations in clear-cut forests. He was the first to use the termsuccession (prior toSteenstrups use) about an ecological phenomenon and probably the first to use the termcommunity (ecology) (societé) for an assemblage of (plant) individuals of different species (prior toKarl Möbius).^[2]

• 1777 births
• 1857 deaths
• People from Saint-Domingue
• French geographers
• French naturalists
• 19th-century French historians
• French draughtsmen
• Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery
• French people of Haitian descent
• French male non-fiction writers

• Use dmy dates from November 2019