Champignons des plantes : les premiers agents pathogènes reconnus dans l’histoire des sciences

The eighteenth century is the beginning of the scientific emergence of plant pathology. Naturalists disproved spontaneous generation, meteorological and supernatural origins of plant diseases. It is necessary to explain plant alterations and to find possibilities of control to reduce significant losses of yield and to limit famine. In 1728, the words ‘plant parasite’,’plant disease’, and ‘epidemics’ were used for the first time. In 1755, the first seed treatment and, in 1805 the first description of a whole cycle of plant disease were proposed. In the nineteenth century much work on bunt and rusts of wheat, potato downy mildew, and grape vine powdery mildew established the scientific status of plant pathology. A retrospective analysis of these early developments shows a very good concordance with Koch’s postulate published one century later.