Alcide Charles Victor Marie Dessalines d'Orbigny was a French naturalist who made major contributions in many areas, including zoology, palaeontology, geology, archaeology and anthropology.
D'Orbigny was born in Couëron, the son of a ship's physician and amateur naturalist. The family moved to La Rochelle in 1820, where his interest in natural history was developed while studying the marine fauna and especially the microscopic creatures that he named "foraminiferans".
In Paris he became a disciple of the geologist Pierre Louis Antoine Cordier and Georges Cuvier. All his life, he would follow the theory of Cuvier and stay opposed to Lamarckism.