Skip to main content

Primary sourceBook1866 (read 1865)

Versuche über Pflanzen-Hybriden

Gregor Mendel · 1866 (read 1865)

Mendel's founding scientific paper on pea plant crosses, which first laid out the 3:1 ratio and the concepts of dominant and recessive traits.

This is Mendel's own scientific paper, written and read by him, founding the science of genetics.

Ask Gregor Mendel about this sourceView the original(opens in new tab)
Scan of the first text page of Gregor Mendel's 'Versuche über Pflanzen-Hybriden', with the title, author name, presentation date note, and the opening section 'Einleitende Bemerkungen' in German black-letter-style print on aged paper.
Gregor Mendel, Versuche über Pflanzen-Hybriden, 1866. Verhandlungen des naturforschenden Vereines in Brünn, vol. IV.

About this source

What it is

This is Gregor Mendel's paper 'Experiments on Plant Hybridization,' read aloud at scientific meetings in February and March 1865 and printed in 1866 in the journal of the Natural History Society of Brno.

Why it matters

In this paper Mendel described years of careful pea-plant breeding experiments. He introduced the terms 'dominant' and 'recessive' and worked out the mathematical ratios behind inheritance, reasoning that later became known as the laws of segregation and independent assortment. The paper went largely unnoticed in Mendel's lifetime but became the foundation of modern genetics once rediscovered decades later.

Look closer

  • Why might a paper presented at local scientific meetings have taken years to become famous?
  • What kind of patience and record-keeping would experiments like these have required?
  • How does Mendel introduce his own work in relation to earlier researchers he names?

This book is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Gregor Mendel on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

More Gregor Mendel sources

Meet the AI Gregor Mendel →
Black-and-white portrait of a man with short wavy hair, wire-rimmed spectacles, and a dark high-collared coat with a white clerical collar, facing the camera against a white background.Photograph

Primary source

Gregor Mendel

Unknown

Black-and-white group photograph of ten monks in long dark robes posed together, with a caption below naming them, including Gregor Mendel, and the title 'Plate III. Gregor Johann Mendel among his Fellow-Monks'.Photograph

Primary source

Mendel with other monks

Unknown

Black-and-white photograph of a long, low wooden building with a corrugated metal roof and a row of small-paned windows, partly overgrown with shrubs and climbing plants. A brick base is visible at right. A printed caption at the bottom reads: Abb. 16 Mendels Bienenstock im Altbrünner Klostergarten.Photograph

Primary source

Mendel's Beehouse

Unknown · before 1909

Black handwritten cursive signature on white background, reading 'Gregor Mendel' with a smaller abbreviated mark ('Ohh' or similar) written beneath it.Document

Primary source

Signature of Gregor Mendel

Gregor Mendel

Black and white studio portrait of a man with short, wavy hair and thin round wire-rimmed glasses, wearing a dark clerical cassock buttoned to the neck with a white collar. A long chain with a cross pendant hangs on his chest. He faces left against a plain grey background.Photograph

Primary source

Gregor Mendel with Cross

Unknown

Ready when you are

Start chatting with Gregor Mendel now.

20 messages free · No credit card · Available in 50+ languages.

Trial Humy for freeGet a quote for institutions