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Introduction: The knowledge of British and Irish bryophytes has been summarised at intervals since 1690 in national floras and checklists. The number of species and varieties recognised in these works can be used to track the discovery of British and Irish bryophytes. Methods: The main floras and checklists were identified, and the taxa recognised in twenty of them counted and their identity assessed in relation to the current (2021) checklist. Key results: The number of known bryophytes increased rapidly after the publication of Ray's Synopsis (1690). Dillenius's (1741) Historia muscorum brought together all previous reports. His polynomials were the main source for Linnaeus's binomial names in Species plantarum (1753). Linnaeus cut the number of British and Irish species from 179 to 119, omitting those that seemed to him obscure. It was clumsily done, and William Hudson (1762), in Flora Anglica, increased the number to 139, with 51 varieties, of which 37 are now treated as species. His contemporary Richard Pulteney made an early attempt to trace first records in a manuscript compiled ca. 1789. We agree with 134 of Pulteney's first records, but disagree with 88. All the historic lists contain redundancies – species that were then thought distinct but are now lumped together, the maximum being Smith's (1804) Flora Britannica, with 62. From 1855 to 1930 numerous varieties were recognised. These peaked at 309 moss varieties in Duncan's (1926) checklist and 117 liverworts in Wilson's (1930) checklist. In 2021 they have shrunk to 33 moss varieties and 9 liverworts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: We examine the discovery of British and Irish bryophytes, based on a database of their first records. For 1140 taxa in the current (2021) checklist we have compiled information on the place and date of the first record, the finder and the author and place of its publication. The full database is posted on the Zenodo repository. Here we analyse changes over time in the attributes (e.g. size) of newly discovered species, their location and the main finders. Methods: We checked first records reported in bryological publications, extracting the relevant details for our database. Most are supported by herbarium specimens. To check on these we have relied mainly on the expertise of others, examining only a few specimens ourselves. Key results: Unlike flowering plants, very few bryophytes were known until ca. 1690 and the first to be discovered tended to be widespread, large species with frequent sporophytes, growing in lowland England. After Dillenius's Historia muscorum (1741) there was a major trough in activity, extending to the 1780s. Thereafter there was a surge in records from the Highlands of Scotland (from 1790) and western Ireland (from 1809). The flood of new moss records in the early nineteenth century culminated in the 1850s, with William Wilson making an outstanding contribution. New liverwort records increased later in the century and peaked between 1900 and 1909. There followed a further trough for both groups from 1920 to 1949. Since then the rate of discovery has remained steady at about 2.8 species per year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]