EN
A brief historical overview of the discovery of sexuality in flowering plants (Angiosperms) is given. The former assumption that pictures on Assyrian and Babylonian buildings represent pollination activity has to be corrected by new archeological insights. Antiquity and the Middle Ages delivered no real progress in the knowledge of higher plant sexuality. Real progress is linked to the introduction of light microscopy and experimentation. Investigators such as N. Grew, J. Bobart and R. J. Camerarius provided new information on sex organs in plants. Countercurrents of opinion remained active, based on Aristotle’s and Theophrastus’s beliefs. J.G. Koelreuter and G.B. Amici made breakthroughs in the recognition of the equal role of the sexes in reproduction. Fusion of the sperm and egg nuclei was observed by E. Strasburger. Double fertilization was a multiple discovery by S. Navashin and L. Guignard. New strategies are making the sexual and fertilization processes amenable to genetic manipulation and biotechnology.