Felipe Poey

Felipe Poey y Aloy (May 26, 1799 - January 28, 1891) was a Cuban zoologist.

Poey was born in Havana, the son of French and Spanish parents. He studied law in Madrid. He became a lawyer in Spain but was forced to leave due to his liberal ideas, returning to Cuba in 1823. He began to concentrate on the study of the natural science and travelled to France in 1825. He began writing on the butterflies of Cuba and acquiring knowledge on fish, supplying Cuvier and Valenciennes with fish specimens from Cuba.

Poey returned to Cuba in 1833 where he founded the Museum of Natural History in 1839. In 1842 he became the first professor of zoology and comparative anatomy at the University of Havana.

Works

• Centurie des Lepidoptees de File de Cuba (Paris, 1832)
• Historia Natural de la Isla de Cuba (2 vols., 1860)
• Ictiología Cubana, a 20-volume work on the fishes of Cuba