April 2020 marks the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. Organizations around the world have commemorated the occasion by participating in the global Earth Optimism movement — an initiative spearheaded by the Smithsonian to “turn the conservation conversation from doom and gloom to optimism and opportunity”.

Throughout 2020, the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) and our partners are joining the movement by sharing conservation success stories from and made possible by the BHL collection. Follow our blog for conservation stories — past and present — and visit our website for more information and to explore our Earth Optimism book collection.

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We often think of natural history libraries serving as memorials for lost species—animals like the passenger pigeon and the dodo living on only in books, photos, and illustrations that tell sad cautionary tales of once-abundant populations lost to overhunting or habitat destruction.

However, historic records also tell stories of hope, providing valuable resources for modern scientists working to protect threatened wildlife. Since it was founded in 2006, BHL’s historical documents have supported the work of conservationists devoted to saving everything from Caribbean mammals to rare wetland plants. Not only are accessible records that describe the historic ranges, populations, and other characteristics of a species essential for researchers, but they help remind the public of how vibrant historical ecosystems were—and the importance of protecting what is left.

“The real advantage of BHL is keeping our ecological memory intact, and not allowing us to collectively forget how beautiful, wild, and diverse ecosystems of the past were,” wrote historical ecologist Dr. Joshua Drew in a blog post from BHL’s 2020 Earth Optimism campaign. “If we succumb to this collective amnesia, we risk setting our conservation bar too low and allowing the dulling of our natural environments to continue without even recognizing our losses.”

As part of BHL’s Earth Optimism series, we’re sharing the conservation success stories of four bird species, all prominently featured in the BHL collection, whose impending losses were reversed through the efforts of concerned citizens and researchers.

Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus)

The United States’ emblematic bird was almost lost in the mid-20th century. The eagle officially made the nation’s symbol in 1782 and received special attention in early natural history texts documenting the country’s wildlife. Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), the first naturalist to publish a complete ornithology of North American birds, noted that they were, “as the adopted emblem of our country, entitled to particular notice.”

Overhunting caused the decline of bald eagle populations in the early 1900s. While the hunting of the birds was prohibited in 1940, the widespread use of the pesticide DDT—a chemical that collects in fish, a staple of the eagles’ diet—reduced their numbers to only 417 mating pairs in 1963. As researchers raised awareness of the eagles’ plight, conservationists rallied to save them, and bald eagles became some of the first species protected under the US Endangered Species Act of 1973. Since then, they have made an impressive recovery, thanks to the restriction of DDT use and reintroduction programs.

Wood Stork (Mycteria americana)

Populations of the wood stork plummeted in the late 20th century, until efforts to protect its delicate wetland habitat raised its numbers. In The Birds of America (1827 -1838), John James Audubon described wood storks (then known as wood ibises) as being “abundant in Florida and lower Louisiana” and wrote that he had seen flocks of thousands. By 1984, the once-populous wood stork was labeled as federally endangered. While the birds had previously nested primarily in Florida, changes to the hydrology in their habitat from the late 60s to early 80s had resulted in a significant decrease in their population, driving them north.

“By the 1970s, almost the entire population of wood storks were dependent on the nesting success that the birds had here,” said conservationist Charles Lane in an interview with the Oak Spring Garden Foundation. Lane is a leader of the ACE Basin Taskforce, which aims to protect the basin around South Carolina’s Ashepoo, Combahee and Edisto rivers—one of the largest undeveloped estuaries on the Atlantic coast.

A three-decade effort from Lane and other concerned landowners to restore and manage the ACE basin wetlands for wildlife caused a marked increase in wood stork populations. The basin now supports the largest concentration of wood stork nesting colonies in the nation, and the bird was removed from the endangered species list in 2014.

American White Pelican (Pelecanus erythrorhynchos)

Another wetland bird whose impressive size and curious appearance drew the attention of early naturalists, the white pelican was nearly lost in the mid-20th century, largely due to habitat degradation. The birds primarily breed on isolated islands located in the North American interior, and the use of pesticides, as well as the draining of wetlands, caused breeding populations to nosedive. However, the national ban on DDT in 1972—as well the implementation of more stringent environmental protection laws, including the US Endangered Species Act—resulted in a reversal of fortune for the birds. As of 2014, their population has increased roughly tenfold since the late 1960s, resulting in the species’ conservation status being changed from “endangered” to “threatened” in 2016 in Washington State. Along with the wood stork, they can be seen in South Carolina’s ACE Basin.

Bobolink (Dolichonyx oryzivorus)

The distinctive characteristics of the bobolink have captured the attention of writers, artists, and scientists for centuries. Early colonists knew them as rice birds due to their annual descent on southern rice fields; in the Natural History of the Carolinas, Florida, and the Bahama Islands (1729-1747), Mark Catesby wrote that the male birds’ black-and-yellow plumage was “so singular and extraordinary . . . I cannot pass it over without notice.”

Long a fixture in hayfields and grasslands throughout the United States, the bobolink has declined by around 65% over the past several decades, largely due to the loss of their easily-developed habitat. However, as grassland bird conservationists work with landowners to change their land management practices, researchers have observed an increase in bobolinks in certain areas over the past few years. One of those regions is Northern Virginia, said Amy Johnson, Program Director at Virginia Working Landscapes.

“…Folks are setting aside that acreage to allow these birds to breed,” Johnson told the Oak Spring Garden Foundation. “I would say anecdotally that we’re seeing an increase in bobolinks in that area, right around Upperville.”

To learn more about how the Oak Spring Garden Foundation is working with other organizations to protect declining bird species, visit the OSGF blog.

Recently, we spent three weeks on student placement at Museums Victoria Library and were fortunate enough to be involved with the digitisation of the beautiful title The birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands and the Australasian South Polar quadrant by Gregory M. Mathews. It was an eye-opening experience, making us aware of the patience and attention to detail that is a necessity for book digitisation.

In order to get suitably high resolution scans, a Zeutschel OS 16000 scanner is primarily used for Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) digitisations at Museums Victoria. The Australian branch of the project, BHL Australia, digitises the collections of 25 organisations across the country. It is hosted by Museums Victoria and funded by the Atlas of Living Australia.

As this title was rare, it was essential to handle it gently, and to protect the spine from excessive pressure. To ensure minimal impact, we wore gloves when in contact with the book, and scanned one page at a time. We scanned all right-hand pages first, before turning the book around and repeating the process for the left-hand pages. The glass pane normally used to pin pages down on ordinary books can’t be used on rare books, so getting pages to lie flat was a challenge in itself! This digitisation project has given us a chance to see a lot of this beautiful title, with its multitude of breathtaking illustrations.

Both of us are currently working towards the Master of Information Management qualification at RMIT University. Being involved with the BHL project has been invaluable to our understanding of the challenges and importance of digitisation. As digital technology continues to develop and evolve, digitisation provides exceptional opportunities for further access and research. As such, digitisation is likely to play a significant role in our careers in information management into the future, and we are highly grateful to have had the opportunity to be involved in such a project.

The birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands and the Australasian South Polar quadrant is a remarkable guide to the birds of some of Australia’s more outlying territories, specifically Norfolk and Lord Howe Islands and areas of the Antarctic. Published in 1928, the title contains detailed description and distribution information for a number of species, as well as beautiful illustrations of each bird. Many of the species covered in the book were extinct when the book was published, while others became extinct in the decades afterwards. This adds to the unique nature of this title. Only 225 copies of this work were produced, and around 57 are currently held in library collections worldwide.

The book was written by noted ornithologist Gregory Macalister Mathews. Born in 1876, Mathews grew up in Australia before moving to England, where his interest in birds became an obsession. Over his life Mathews contributed to a significant number of ornithological works, but none drew more attention than his Birds of Australia (which is also available on the BHL website, the final volumes of which were digitised by the BHL Australia project at Museums Victoria). During the creation of Birds of Australia, he regularly worked 16 hour days, and through the course of this work he acquired 30,000 skins and around 5,000 books.

Despite dedicating much of his life to their study, Mathews “was not really interested in the living bird”, and was “essentially a bibliophile” (Kloot, 1986). Mathews stressed that The birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands was not a supplement to his far more famous Birds of Australia, but he did believe that the birds discussed should be considered part of any list of Australian birds. Certainly, it follows the same format, has the same publisher and should be considered a related work.

The birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands includes 45 hand-coloured lithographs and monochrome plates, with this work being one of the last publications worldwide to include hand-coloured plates (Pasquier & Farrand 1991). These were the work of two illustrators — Henrik Grönvold and Frederick William Frohawk.

Grönvold was a well-known Danish naturalist and lithographer who predominately illustrated birds and their eggs. Born in 1858, he worked on a wide range of ornithological works, including Birds of Africa and The British Warblers, and he created a remarkable 600 plates for Mathew’s Birds of Australia.

Frederick William Frohawk was born in 1861 and had an interest in illustration and natural history from an early age, catching a rare pale clouded yellow butterfly at the age of seven. Despite losing virtually all sight in one eye during his school years, he went on to become a noted illustrator of butterflies and birds. Among his notable works is The complete book of British butterflies, which he both wrote and illustrated.

References

Kloot, T 1986, ‘Mathews, Gregory Macalister (1876–1949)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/mathews-gregory-macalister-7517

Pasquier, R. F., & Farrand, J., Jr 1991, Masterpieces of Bird Art: 700 Years of Ornithological Illustration. Abbeville Press. pp. 180–181.

This Women’s History Month, we invite you to join us in celebrating women in natural history as part of an international social media campaign produced in collaboration with our partners — Her Natural History: A Celebration of Women in Natural History.

Through social media and blog posts, interactive programming and citizen science opportunities, Her Natural History aims to increase awareness of and information about women in the biodiversity sciences.

The campaign will kick-off with an all-day social media blitz on Friday, 8 March 2019 (International Women’s Day) and continue throughout the month with additional posts and programming, including a Wikipedia Editing Workshop on 13 March. #HerNaturalHistory is also the @iglibraries #LibrariesOfInstagram challenge topic for March.

We hope you’ll join us for the social media blitz on 8 March and throughout the month by following #HerNaturalHistory on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram and using the hashtag to share stories, collections, publications, artworks, archival materials, exhibits, and other resources highlighting women and their contributions to natural history.

Learn more about the campaign on the Her Natural History webpage, and stay tuned for more information in the coming weeks. We look forward to celebrating #HerNaturalHistory with you in March!

Her Natural History: A Celebration of Women in Natural History

When? 8-31 March, 2019
Where? Social Media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram)
What? Join us in celebrating women in natural history this Women’s History Month! Follow along and join the campaign using #HerNaturalHistory.
More Information: s.si.edu/hernaturalhistory

The “Anthropocene Defaunation” and the Lost Florida Zestos Skipper

We are experiencing a “biological annihilation.”

That’s how scientists are describing the biodiversity loss in what is being recognized as Earth’s sixth mass extinction event [1]. Not only are extinctions occurring at a rate 100 times higher than would occur naturally, but overall populations are also shrinking at alarming rates [1,2].

A 2014 Science report termed it the “Anthropocene defaunation”, reflecting humanity’s role in this biodiversity loss [3]. Among the casualties in this “Age of Humans” is one of “the few butterflies known to have become extinct in the United States” [4] — The Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly Epargyreus zestos oberon (Worthington, 1881) [5]. This butterfly’s story draws forth science, taxonomy, history, and art from the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) for a cutting edge representation of biodiversity in challenging times.

The recorded scientific history of the Zestos Skipper Butterfly extends back to the early nineteenth century. In the 1819 publication Verzeichniss bekannter Schmettlinge [sic], Jacob Hübner first listed the butterfly as Proteides zestos. Hübner later illustrated the P. zestos holotype (type locality “Surinam”, probably in error) via two figures of a female specimen in his Zuträge zur Sammlung exotischer Schmetterlinge (1826). However, as Hübner provided no description to accompany the name and illustration, it was not until 1832, after his death, that his assistant Carl Geyer officially described Proteides zestos as a new species.

Over the next 50 years, this rather unassuming reddish-brown Skipper, with a range from the Florida Keys to the Caribbean, was reclassified and redescribed by various authors. In Dublin, William F. Kirby (1871) assigned it to a new genus (Telegonus zestos) and in Chicago, Charles E. Worthington (1881), examining 31 specimens from Marco Island, Florida, described it as a new species (Endamus [sic] oberon), based on its resemblance to Eudamus tityrus. In 1884, Eugene M. Aaron, after evaluating over 160 specimens of tityrus and zestos, concluded that Proteides zestos, Telegonus zestos, and Eudamus oberon were in fact the same species.

Dr. Marc C. Minno (Insect Ecologist with Eco-Cognizant in Gainesville, FL) began searching for the Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly in 2006. At his request, Skipper butterfly expert Dr. George T. Austin evaluated Zestos Skipper butterfly specimens in the Florida Museum of Natural History collection with type localities from Florida and the Caribbean. Before his death, Austin concluded that the Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly actually represents a unique subspecies or sibling species [6]. Based on his own observations and Austin’s comments, Minno believes “oberon” to be the valid name of the Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly population and has, until he can complete Austin’s study, designated it as Epargyreus zestos oberon (Worthington, 1881) [5].

Over the past 50 years, the Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly population has been in decline. According to Minno, this butterfly, “once locally common in coastal areas of southern Florida”, had “disappeared from the mainland” by the mid-1980s. The last known sightings of Florida Zestos Skippers occurred in January 2004, at the Key West Tropical Forest and Botanical Garden in Stock Island, Florida [6].

In 2012, Minno et al., concluded a six-year survey looking for declining butterfly species in southern Florida [4]. Because the study failed to produce a single sighting of the Florida Zestos Skipper, in any stage of life, it was recommended that it be presumed extinct. Together with the Rockland Meske’s Skipper, these represent the “first [known] butterfly extinctions in Florida” [4].

The Florida Zestos Skipper exists now only in museums and the pages of historic literature, its memory preserved in natural history collections, libraries, and repositories like the Biodiversity Heritage Library.

Vanity: An Artist’s Story of Extinction and Rediscovery in the “Age of Humans”

The Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly is just one of the “biological specimens” featured in Vanity, an art installation by Joseph Gregory Rossano. Created for and with the support of the Museum of Glass (MOG) in Tacoma, Washington, Vanity was on display at MOG from March 3 – August 30, 2015. The exhibition tells the story of eleven species and subspecies, presumed extinct, presented through the lens of humanity’s role in their demise.

The installation includes eleven “vanity” cabinets. The cabinet doors, Rossano’s “portrait” of man, are composed of imperfect wood laminate adorned with visual representations of Homo sapiens’ DNA barcode. On the bottom corner of each door, a scientific label hints to the species’ or subspecies’ identity inside the cabinet, beneath these human “fingerprints”. Rossano depicts the species through “faded” pencil portraits and as transparent glass sculptures suspended in clear liquid, inside period specimen jars. The overall effect is of a species vanishing behind the portrait of humanity…just as it has in reality.

Beneath each cabinet are mirrored, almond-shaped glass sculptures and in front of each, a chair with a specimen label: Homo sapiens. These objects accentuate humanity’s role in the loss of each species, for, as Rossano articulates in the exhibition catalogue, “When viewing Vanity from a seated position, we see ourselves reflected in these forms that echo the divine. In our vanity we reflect generations of humans who saw themselves as divine, while the truly divine—our 11 innocent and bygone species, subspecies, and their stories—reflect the truth about us” [7].

Rossano’s use of glass as a medium is equally deliberate: “like our environment, glass is transparent, fragile, and reflective — transparent in that it hides nothing, fragile in that once damaged it may never be repaired, and reflective of how we have impacted it” [8].

Each cabinet also offers a QR code leading to historical accounts of the enclosed species. These accounts summarize the species’ “discovery” (collection date, type locality, collector, scientific illustrations, etc.), humanity’s role in its extinction, and the year it was declared “Extinct”. To produce these species tales, Rossano collaborated with Sandra I. Berríos-Torres, MD. Berríos-Torres served as author of the 11 historical accounts and as Editorial Director of the exhibition catalogue, on behalf of Joseph Gregory Rossano.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library was a crucial resource for Berríos-Torres. Consulting dozens of publications in BHL while conducting research for Vanity, she ultimately cited 16 of them in the historical accounts that were incorporated into the exhibition and catalogue. The Florida Zestos Skipper Butterfly had the highest number of BHL citations in Vanity. Berríos-Torres used BHL to follow the butterfly’s taxonomic journey from its first listing by Hübner in 1819 to Aaron’s evaluation of the species in 1884.

“BHL resources were invaluable in my research for Vanity, in particular for accessing publications with the first collection, scientific description, and illustrations,” affirms Berríos-Torres. “The publications dated from 1819 to 2002, were published in English, German, Dutch, and French, and were contributed to BHL by 10 institutions, including university libraries, museums, government libraries, scientific research institutions, and botanical garden libraries across the USA, Canada, and England.”

From BOLD to Vanity

Berríos-Torres is an orthopaedic surgeon and a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention trained epidemiologist who has conducted laboratory and field research on infectious diseases and had a lead role in public health responses to national and international infectious disease outbreaks. Berríos-Torres was initially introduced to Rossano in the fall of 2009 at the opening of his BOLD exhibit, which examined species identity through art and incorporated Barcode of Life Data Systems‘ (BOLD) DNA barcodes into the installation’s sculptures.

BOLD was inspired by Rossano’s 2008 visit to the Área de Conservación Guanacaste (ACG) in northwestern Costa Rica at the invitation of Bradley Zlotnick, MD. At ACG, Rossano learned about DNA barcoding and met Zlotnick’s mentors, tropical ecologists Dr. Daniel H. Janzen and Dr. Winnie Hallwachs. Their 2004 landmark study on cryptic butterfly species, in collaboration with researchers at Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History (John M. Burns) and the University of Guelph, Canada (Paul D. N. Hebert, Erin H. Penton), “…illustrate(d) the value of DNA barcoding, especially when coupled with traditional taxonomic tools, in disclosing hidden diversity” [9]. Barcodes offered a “rediscovery” of biodiversity. Concurrently with BOLD, Rossano’s Whitewashed exhibition “…aimed at revealing our own species’ whitewashing of Man’s relationship with nature throughout time” [7].

In 2013, the art critic for the Seattle Stranger drew a parallel between Whitewashed and a blog post about eight animal species and three subspecies reported as “Extinct”, including the Eskimo Curlew, Numenius borealis (Forster, 1772), one of the species highlighted in Whitewashed and also featured in the blog. The post inspired Rossano to imagine a new installation on extinction, and Vanity was born.

Vanity and the Biodiversity Heritage Library

Berríos-Torres first discovered BHL in December 2014 while performing literature searches for the species’ historical accounts in Vanity. It quickly became a daily part of her research process.

“Between December 2014 and March 2015, in the three short months allotted to research and compose the historical accounts of the 11 animals depicted in the exhibition, I used BHL on a daily basis,” shares Berríos-Torres. “In the following months, as Editorial Director of the Vanity exhibition catalogue, I used BHL several times a week, in search of illustrations.”

Tracking down relevant publications required quite a bit of sleuthing. For this, BHL’s various advanced search options proved invaluable.

“In general, the most important aspect of the BHL resources lay in the ability to access first descriptions and early illustrations,” explains Berríos-Torres. “At the onset, the only information I had was the species’ or subspecies’ common and scientific names. A Google search on the scientific names yielded two additional pieces of information: the last name of the person who first described it in the scientific literature and the date of that description. Rarely could I readily find the full name of the person who described it or the original citation. The opportunity to employ varied advanced search strategies in BHL proved indispensable, particularly when starting with such limited information on the subject.”

In addition to the Zestos Skipper Butterfly, BHL provided valuable references for several other species featured in Vanity, including a freshwater shrimp from Java Macrobrachium leptodactylus (de Man, 1879a), the Clouded Leopard of Formosa (Taiwan) Neofelis nebulosa (Griffith, 1821), and the Scioto Madtom Catfish Noturus trautmani (Taylor, 1969).

The Scioto Madtom Catfish was first described by Smithsonian scientist Dr. William R. Taylor, former curator of fishes at the National Museum of Natural History, based on a “funny looking catfish” collected by Dr. Milton B. Trautman in 1943, from Big Darby Creek in Pickaway County, Ohio [14]. Using BHL, Berríos-Torres was able to retrieve Taylor’s original description and a photograph of the holotype, a male specimen housed in the Smithsonian collections. Scioto madtom has not been observed since Trautman’s last collected specimen in 1957 [15]. Habitat loss and competition from the Northern Madtom Noturus stigmosus (Taylor, 1969) may have contributed to Scioto Madtom’s extinction [15,16]. In 2013, the IUCN Red List declared Noturus trautmani “Extinct” [17].

Beyond Vanity

The themes in BOLD and Vanity continue to evolve and converge. In 2017, Dr. Jacob J.D. Egge, scientific collaborator on the Vanity exhibition catalogue, championed bringing Vanity to The University Gallery at Pacific Lutheran University (PLU, Tacoma, Washington). There, Rossano expanded the installation to include select biological specimens from Washington state and housed in PLU’s Burton Ostenson Natural History Museum collection. The specimens were displayed atop multiple antique mirrored vanities across from the original installation and included a taxidermied woodpecker alongside Rossano’s clear glass sculpture of the same. Berríos-Torres compiled a supplement to the Vanity exhibition catalogue composed of natural history summaries of the PLU specimens, written by students in Egge’s Natural History of Vertebrates course. The students’ writings were incorporated into the expanded installation through QR codes on the wall, alongside the corresponding museum specimen. In 2018, Egge and Rossano presented on their Vanity collaboration at the University of Puget Sound’s Art|Sci: Art+Science salon.

The La Jolla Historical Society, inspired by Vanity, invited Rossano to create a work that reflected a part of San Diego’s biodiversity for the 2018 La Jolla Canyons: Place, Diversity, Connections exhibition (Wisteria Cottage, La Jolla, California). The Solitary Vireo cryptic species complex [18,19], revealed by DNA sequencing to be three distinct songbird species, includes Cassin’s vireo Vireo cassinii (Xántus, 1858), the only one of the three that migrates through San Diego County. Rossano displayed three morphologically indistinguishable clear glass vireo sculptures, blown in the likeness of museum collection specimens and identified solely through scientific tags or DNA barcodes (as in BOLD), atop an antique mirrored vanity (as in Vanity at PLU).

BHL: Discovery and Rediscovery for Bioliteracy

Vanity asks the viewer to face their own culpability in the loss of our biodiversity heritage. The question is, will we listen? Will we heed the warnings that the tales of species like the Zestos Skipper convey? Or will our own vanity get in the way? As this heritage continues to disappear, do we face a future where the historic literature and museum collections become the only places where we can explore and appreciate these “lost” species? As Dr. Minno wrote in his personal reflection on the Zestos Skipper Butterfly for the Vanity exhibition catalogue:

“[Vanity] gives us a chance to think about our role in this beautiful and vibrant world. The butterflies are telling us that something is wrong with the environment. We must learn to live modestly and to protect our planet if butterflies, as well as humans, are to survive” [20].

From historic literature and museum specimens, to traditional morphological taxonomy and modern DNA barcoding techniques, Vanity and BOLD convey and reflect more than just humanity’s role in this epoch’s loss of biodiversity. Rossano’s installations highlight the “renaissance of taxonomy” [21], the need for continued scientific exploration, and the opportunities that abound in gaining a better understanding Earth’s biodiversity. Mora et al., have predicted that, “In spite of 250 years of taxonomic classification and over 1.2 million species already catalogued in a central database…some 86% of existing species on Earth and 91% of species in the ocean still await description” [22].

As Berríos-Torres’ reflection on her research for Vanity demonstrates, access to historic literature, images, and other library materials are vital to cataloguing, understanding, and communicating Earth’s biological heritage.

“BHL is unparalleled and vital in providing worldwide access to a free, publicly available, digital biodiversity repository and reference library,” affirms Berríos-Torres. “For scientists and the public alike, BHL complements the DNA barcode taxonomy reference sequences to discover and rediscover biodiversity. Together they are rich wells of collaboration democratizing global bioliteracy.”

 

Acknowledgements

Berríos-Torres wishes to acknowledge Joseph Gregory Rossano, Museum of Glass, Bradley Zlotnick, MD, C.B. Bell III, and all Collaborating Scientists:

• Franco Andreone, PhD, Museo Regionale di Scienze Naturali, Italy (Cape Verde Giant Skink)
• Neil Burkhead, MS, (Retired) United States Geological Survey (USGS), Southeast Ecological Science Center, USA (Santa Cruz [Monkey Spring] Pupfish)
• Po-Jen Chiang, PhD Formosan Wild Sound Conservation Science Center Co. Taiwan (Clouded Leopard of Formosa)
• Neil Cumberlidge, PhD, Chair, IUCN Freshwater Crustacean Specialist Group, USA (Freshwater Shrimp from Java)
• Jacob J. D. Egge, PhD, Pacific Lutheran University, USA (Scioto Madtom Catfish)
• Robert E. Gill, Jr. MS, USGS, Alaska Science Center, USA (Eskimo Curlew)
• Lonnie I. Grassman, PhD Texas A&M University, USA (Clouded Leopard of Formosa)
• Marc C. Minno, PhD, Eco-Cognizant, Inc. USA (Rockland Meske’s Skipper & Florida Zestos Skipper Butterflies)
• Rohan Pethiyagoda B.Sc., M.Phil, (Retired) Australian Museum, Australia (Sri Lanka Spiny Eel)
• Edwin P. (Phil) Pister, MA – Desert Fishes Council, USA
• Hubert Planton, DVM, Veterinarian and African Wildlife Consultant, France (Western Black Rhino)
• Claudio Soto-Azat, MV, MSc, PhD, Universidad Andrés Bello, Chile (Northern Darwin Frog)
• Raquel Vasconcelos, PhD, University of Porto, Portugal (Cape Verde Giant Skink)

References

[1] Ceballos G., Ehrlich P.R., Dirzo R. (2017). Biological Annihilation via the Ongoing Sixth Mass Extinction Signaled by Vertebrate Population Losses and Declines. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Jul, 114 (30) E6089-E6096; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1704949114.

[2] Ceballos G., Ehrlich P.R., Barnosky A.D., García A., Pringle R.M., and Palmer T.M. (2015). Accelerated Modern Human–Induced Species Losses: Entering the Sixth Mass Extinction. Science Advances 1(5). e1400253DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1400253.

[3] Dirzo R., Young H.S., Galetti M., Ceballos G., Isaac N.J.B., Collen B. (2014). Defaunation in the Anthropocene. Science 345(6195): pp. 401-406. DOI: 10.1126/science.1251817.

[4] Minno M. C., Daniels J., Jue D. K. (2012). Statement on the Extinction, Decline, and Loss of Butterflies in South Florida. Available at http://www.bio.miami.edu/horvitz/Plant-animal%20interactions%202013/conservation/required%20readings/Statement%20on%20Species%20Loss%20June%202012%20MC%20Minno.pdf. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[5] Schweitzer D. F., Minno M. C., and Wagner D. L. (2011). Rare, Declining, and P​oorly Known Butterflies and Moths (Lepidoptera) of Forests and Woodlands in the Eastern United States. U.S. Forest Service, Forest Health Technology Enterprise Team, FHTET-2011-01. USDA Forest Service, Morgantown, West Virginia. 517 pp.

[6] Minno M.C. (2010). Butterfly Extinctions in South Florida. American Butterflies 8(3):17. Available at: http://www.naba.org/pubs/ab183/ab183_extinctions.pdf. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[7] Rossano, J.G. (2015). Preface. In S.I. Berríos-Torres (Ed.), Joseph Gregory Rossano: Vanity (pp.13-16). Tacoma, WA: Museum of Glass.

[8] Lawrimore S. (2015). Swan Song. In S.I. Berríos-Torres (Ed.), Joseph Gregory Rossano: Vanity (pp.21-26). Tacoma, WA: Museum of Glass.

[9] Hebert P.D.N., Penton E.H., Burns J.M., Janzen D.H., and Hallwachs W. (2004). Ten Species in One: DNA Barcoding Reveals Cryptic Species in the Neotropical Skipper Butterfly Astraptes Fulgerator. PNAS 101(41): 14812-14817. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.0406166101. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[10] Buckley-Beason V.A. et al. (2006). Molecular Evidence for Species-Level Distinctions in Clouded Leopards. Current Biology 16(23):2371-2376. Available at: http://www.cloudedleopard.org/Documents/Val_CB_2006.pdf. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[11] Grassman L., Lynam A., Mohamad S., Duckworth J.W., Bora J., Wilcox D., Ghimirey Y., Reza A. & Rahman H. (2016). Neofelis nebulosa. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2016: e.T14519A97215090. http://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-1.RLTS.T14519A97215090.en. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[12] De Grave S., Smith K.G., Adeler N.A., Allen D.J., Alvarez F., Anker A., et al. (2015). Dead Shrimp Blues: A Global Assessment of Extinction Risk in Freshwater Shrimps (Crustacea: Decapoda: Caridea). PLoS ONE 10(3): e0120198. doi:10.1371/ journal.pone.0120198. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[13] Berríos-Torres S.I. (2015). Freshwater Shrimp from Java. Macrobrachium leptodactylus (de Man, 1879a). In S.I. Berríos-Torres (Ed.), Joseph Gregory Rossano: Vanity (pp.52-56). Tacoma, WA: Museum of Glass.

[14] U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). (1976). National Digital Library. Milton B. Trautman Oral History Transcript. Interview with Milton B. Trautman. Interviewer Michael Smith. “Audio Cassette Dub from Reel-to Reel”. July 1976. Available at: http://digitalmedia.fws.gov/cdm/ref/collection/document/id/1031. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[15] Scioto madtom (Noturus trautmani) 5-Year Review: Summary and Evaluation. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Midwest Region, Ohio Ecological Services Field Office, Columbus, Ohio. Available at: http://www.fws.gov/midwest/endangered/recovery/5yr_rev/pdf/scma5yr2009.pdf. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[16] King C.C. (1981). Prairies of the Darbie Plains in West-Central Ohio. Stuckie & Reese. Ohio Biological Survey Biology Notes 15:108-127. Available at: http://images.library.wisc.edu/EcoNatRes/EFacs/NAPC/NAPC06/reference/econatres.napc06.cking.pdf. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[17] NatureServe. Noturus trautmani. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2013: e.T14908A19032932. http://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2013-1.RLTS.T14908A19032932.en. Accessed on 6 December 2018.

[18] Murray B. W., McGillivray W. B., Barlow J. C., Beech R. N., and Strobeck C. (1994). The Use of Cytochrome B Sequence Variation in Estimation of Phylogeny in the Vireonidae. The Condor 96:1037-1054. https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/condor/v096n04/p1037-p1054.pdf. Accessed on 17 December 2018.

[19] Johnson N.K. (1995). Speciation in Vireos. I. Macrogeographic Patterns of Allozymic Variation in the Vireo Solitarius Complex in the Contiguous United States. The Condor 97:903-919. https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/condor/v097n04/p0903-p0919.pdf. Accessed on 17 December 2018.

[20] Minno, M.C. (2015). Reflections on the Rockland Meske’s Skipper Butterfly and the Zestos Skipper Butterfly. In S.I. Berríos-Torres (Ed.), Joseph Gregory Rossano: Vanity (pp.52-56). Tacoma, WA: Museum of Glass.

[21] Miller S.E. (2007). DNA Barcoding and the Renaissance of Taxonomy. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 104(12): pp. 4775-6. Epub 2007 Mar 15. https://www.pnas.org/content/104/12/4775. Accessed on 17 December 2018.

[22] Mora C, Tittensor DP, Adl S, Simpson AGB, Worm B. (2011). How Many Species Are There on Earth and in the Ocean? PLoS Biol 9(8): e1001127. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001127. Accessed on 17 December 2018.

Natural history illustrations often aim to show life-like flora and fauna. Depictions of birds poised to take flight, fish swimming upstream, and mammals mid-stride are common in 18^th and 19^th century zoology and botany publications. What is lost in these often lavish illustrations is a certain truth about the way many naturalists interacted with their objects of study: many species of plant or animal were first encountered not in the wild, but in the display case, in the form of carefully prepared specimens.

One British naturalist, Captain Thomas Brown (1785-1862), made the practical observation that mounted animal specimens allowed naturalists to “contemplate, without dread, the most destructive and furious quadrupeds, and the most noxious reptiles.” It follows that many dangerous and rare species may not have been studied if not for taxidermy. Similarly, the building up of large and comprehensive natural history collections would not have been possible without a means of preserving specimens for the long term. As early collectors and naturalists quickly realized, proper taxidermy techniques were necessary to ensure that museum and cabinet collections did not degrade and disintegrate over time. Thus, a significant part of natural history is the rather unnatural history of taxidermy and specimen preparation.

While elements of modern taxidermy can be traced back to ancient Egyptian embalming practices, taxidermy as a tool for the study of natural history did not come about until the mid-18^th century. French entomologist René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur’s treatise, ‘Divers means for preserving from corruption dead birds intended to be sent to remote countries, so that they may arrive there in good condition…‘, published in the Transactions of the Royal Society in 1748, is often cited as the first comprehensive discussion of the topic. However, Réaumur proposed techniques for preparing specimens for shipment only, not long-term preservation or display.

More comprehensive techniques developed in the 19^th century into what many referred to as the ‘Art’ of taxidermy, and it was during this time that popular printed manuals on taxidermy proliferated. The Biodiversity Heritage Library currently includes over fifty examples of such manuals, published between 1799 and 1927.

Captain Thomas Brown, better known for his work in the field of conchology (the species of sea-snail Zebina browniania is named after him), published The Taxidermist’s Manual, or, The Art of Collecting, Preparing and Preserving Objects of Natural History in 1833. The work covers in rather gruesome detail the methods for skinning and preparing a range of mammals, fish and birds – including species as large as the elephant – as well as techniques for mounting smaller crustacea and insects. It includes “Mr. Waterton’s method for stuffing birds,” referring to the more famous naturalist Charles Waterton (1782-186), gives recipes for chemical compounds used in preservation, describes two methods for constructing false eyes out of enamel, and lists common prices for some of the supplies required. The manual also gives creative advice for mounting and positioning each species: sloths, for example, should always be mounted in an upright position, as they are seldom seen walking horizontally.

Brown’s general advice to the taxidermist is “copy nature whenever you have it in your power.”

The text is illustrated by plates cut by Scottish engraver Robert Scott. In stark contrast to the life-like creatures often found in many illustrated natural history volumes, the animals here (including what appears to be a poor domestic cat) are very clearly dead, though they are still idealized. More macabre images may be found on plates four and five, which show the various surgical instruments – scalpels, mallets and pliers – used in the various stages of animal taxidermy. Perhaps the strangest inclusion, however, is a short appendix in which Brown describes a newly discovered French technique for preserving the human body.

Popular works like Thomas Brown’s Taxidermist’s manual reveal in morbid detail the unnatural materials and practices that coincided with the study of natural history – the arsenic, wire, stuffing, and false eyes that naturalists employed in their attempts to “avert the process of Time’s destroying hand.”

What is Economic botany?

Economic botany can, in a nutshell (excuse the pun), be described as the use of plants by people. This relationship spans thousands of years and includes both individuals and cultures – making this subject a rich and fascinating link between botany and anthropology. Economic botany collections can essentially be described using the term biocultural.

Kew’s Museum of Economic Botany.

The Economic Botany Collection at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew holds around 100,000 objects from around the globe. Established as the Museum of Economic Botany by Kew’s first official Director, Sir William Jackson Hooker, in 1847, it was cited as a public repository for ‘all kinds of useful and curious Vegetable Products, which neither the living plants of the Garden nor the specimens in the Herbarium could exhibit’.

Raw materials are housed in the Collection, alongside objects ranging from jewellery, musical instruments and an array of dyes and medicines. Many of these items were acquired by Kew during the peak of colonial expansion, with the majority dating from around 1847 to 1930. Kew staff are currently working with indigenous cultures and partner institutions to ensure that traditional crafts, such as the use and manufacture of Tapa (Pacific barkcloth), are being kept alive and in some cases revived in the communities where they first originated.

The Mobile Museum Project.

In parallel with this research and outreach, Kew’s Museum of Economic Botany has recently embarked on a project called The Mobile Museum: Economic Botany in Circulation. This is, in effect, where the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Library, Art & Archives and Biodiversity Heritage Library comes in.

As part of the Mobile Museum project, Kew is digitising and making available online through BHL the Collection’s “Entry and Exit books”. These huge tomes each consist of thousands of entries made by Kew staff over the years, listing every specimen either sent out from or sent in to the Museum of Economic Botany from 1847 right up to the present day. Each book is in the process of being scanned and uploaded to BHL, and the project team, including a number of dedicated volunteers, are working hard to transcribe each page so that there will be both a physical and digital record of these unique and invaluable logbooks. This data transcription is initially being entered into searchable Excel spreadsheets, which will then be transferred into an Access database and raw data files from this will be available to download from the project website.

The existing Kew Economic Botany Database will also be enhanced, with all objects located in other institutions being added. This will mean that interested parties will soon be able to search not just for objects currently in the collection, but also objects that were once at Kew and are now housed elsewhere.

The first of these books, which is now freely available on BHL, is entitled “Specimens Distributed” and spans from 1881 to 1901. It is a fascinating continuous record of specimens, materials and artefacts that were sent from Kew to over 1000 institutions worldwide, including other botanic gardens, schools and universities and local museums.

Specimens distributed.

The first thing that I noticed when researching this blog, as I skimmed through the hundreds of pages of handwritten entries, was just how many plant parts the Museum of Economic Botany held. On first thought, you may think of a few important parts of a plant that could be held in this sort of collection – bark, petals, seeds, stems or similar. But what struck me was the sheer scope of plants and all their various facets that were collected – resins, gums, fibers, bulbs, fruits, roots, pods, pulps, rubbers, even galls (a kind of benign growth on the external tissue of some plants, usually a reaction to parasites or bacteria).

As I browsed the book, I became engrossed in 6 pages in particular entitled November 14th 1887 – Sir James Paget, Royal College of Surgeons – A large collection of specimens of vegetable morphology.

Sir James Paget.

As I looked over these pages, I noticed that words such as “undeveloped”, “abnormal” and “malformation” were preceding plant names or plant parts. It occurred to me that the plants being described had possibly been collected due to their interesting morphological or biological anomalies – and they were being sent out, maybe for further investigation, to Sir James Paget at the Royal College of Surgeons. This name rang a vague bell, so I did a little research.

Sir James Paget is considered one of the most outstanding medical researchers of the 19th century and is known as the father of British pathology. He described diseases including Paget’s disease of the bone and Paget’s disease of the nipple, and throughout his career he stressed how vital science research was for medical practise.

Interestingly, Paget was a close friend of Charles Darwin, who helped his medical research by sharing thoughts and musings. Darwin also sent Paget books, including a book that he wrote on earthworms, prompting this response from Paget: “It seems to me the best that ever you have written in showing the splendid and great truths that may be found in common things”.

The next chapter.

As part of the Mobile Museum Project, Kew are also in the process of digitising the Museum of Economic Botany’s “School Letter Books”. These are logbooks containing hundreds of letters of correspondence between the Museum of Economic Botany and schools across the UK – the first book spanning from 1877 – 1894. These letters are mainly requests from teachers and lecturers who asked Kew for educational objects and samples, either to use as teaching aids or to help establish their own small collections.

The Economic Botany Collection at Kew has a rich and varied history that spans over three centuries. By making these unique books available online through BHL, we hope that more people can make use of the fascinating information held within them that has been so meticulously recorded throughout the years.

 

Cabinets of Wonder: What Are They and Why Were They Created?

The term, “cabinet of wonder”, comes from the term “wunderkammer” (literally meaning “wonder chamber”).  The tradition of creating cabinets of wonder began during the Renaissance, the period of time between the 14th and 17th centuries.

In England and France, these cabinet of wonder collections were called “cabinets” or “curiosity cabinets”.  German speaking countries called the collections a variety of more specific terms: kunstkammer (“art cabinets”), schatzkammer (“treasure cabinets”), rüstkammer (history cabinets), and eventually wunderkammer (“marvel or curiosity cabinets”).  People during the Renaissance referred to these collections generically using the terms “wunderkammer” or “curiosity cabinet” interchangeably.

The first published pictorial representation of a Renaissance cabinet of curiosity in Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale. (Image digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.)

The Renaissance idea of creating a collection of (formerly) animate, inanimate, and botanical objects, and even odd specimens, came from a human desire to place mankind somewhere within the larger scheme of things.  Formerly, European princes built their own private studiolo or cabinets, which contained rare natural objects and books, and acted as status symbols to impress others.  Then the cabinets came to be used for scientific observation and contained more humble–but important–natural objects and specimens.  During the Renaissance, theorists from all fields of academia were making new scientific and philosophical discoveries, and realized that all of this new knowledge sometimes challenged previous beliefs about existence and mankind’s place within it.

Salamander, from Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale (1599). Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

Different from modern museums, wunderkammer were generally created by a single scholar: in our example, Ferrante Imperato (1550-1625), an apothecary and scholar living in Naples.  In addition, the objects were believed to be interconnected by some singular purpose that could shed light on man’s place within existence.

Humanism was one of the most predominant movements in Italy during the Renaissance, and some humanists believed, among other things, in a notion of universalism–the idea that all things and all people were connected by some shared visible and/or invisible similarities, and all created by the divine.

The Renaissance humanists endeavored to use reasoning to explain unknown aspects of nature, which developed into the study of natural history: empirical observations and experimentation were used to make conclusions about the physical world.  Thus the Renaissance, and the creators of cabinets of wonder, were important in setting the stage for extraordinary advances in scientific knowledge in the decades following.

Remora fish, from Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale (1599). Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

What Were the Beliefs of Some Creators of Cabinets of Wonder, and Why Was Ferrante Imperato So Important?

Some creators of cabinets of wonder used for scientific observation and experimentation were pietistic, and stressed living a good and helpful life.  For this reason, the cabinets’ creators often wrote of their collections and made them open to the public to make people aware of the beauty of nature and the usefulness of natural objects.  The creators would also observe and experiment on items in their collections in an endeavor to increase knowledge of all aspects of the world.  Additionally, creators of cabinets of wonder often corresponded with, and visited, one another and discussed their collections and findings to increase the collective knowledge about the natural world and existence.

In this vein of sharing knowledge, Ferrante Imperato was convinced by his son, Francesco, and by his own friends, to produce a written account of his cabinet of wonder, in the form of the 28 books which comprise his work Dell’historia Naturale.  The majority of the work’s books are concerned with stones, minerals, gems and earth (i.e., minerology and related fields).  The last two books deal with living organisms: plants and animals.  Imperato especially featured and worked with herbs used to create medicines as an apothecary.

The first version of Dell’historia Naturale, printed in 1599, totaled 791 pages between the 28 books that comprised it, with 119 woodcut illustrations interspersed throughout the text.  One of the first European natural history research collections, Imperato’s cabinet may have contained as many as 35,000 plant, animal and mineral specimens.  Imperato quoted other authors at the beginning of his subject sections and discussed what he thought of the authors’ ideas, and then launched into his own beliefs about the subjects based on his experimentation on, and observation of, specimens in his cabinet of wonder.

Marine creature and Horned Viper, from Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale (1599). Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

Many creators of these cabinets were drawn to collecting specimens in an endeavor to make life more comfortable for people in acts of piety, either by collecting herbs and natural materials like Imperato did in order to create medicines, or by collecting natural materials believed to be alchemical or metallurgical in order to experiment with new recipes (“segreti”, or “secrets”) to ease human ailments. Sometimes piety, however, was considered heretical by the Catholic Church in Italy at this time due to pietism’s emphasis on individual religious devotion (which leaves room for the idea that the Church may not be needed).

Imperato’s friend and scientific rival, Giovanni Battista Della Porta, who practiced pietism, created the Academia Secretorum Naturae (“Accademia dei Segreti”), which translates to “The Academy of the Mysteries of Nature”, in order to study and share information about natural science with like-minded scholars.  In 1579, Della Porta’s Accademia was accused of sorcery and disbanded by the Pope.

Insects from Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale (1599). Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

Arachnids and other insects from Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale (1599). Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

Some humanist scholars did, in fact, possess objects in their cabinets of wonder believed to have magical properties based on arcane knowledge, and these items included magical lanterns, speaking tubes, and distorting mirrors.  So the humanist sharing of “secrets of nature” did include, for some, secret of a magical (heretical) sort.

Imperato saw his cabinet of wonder as a place to derive knowledge directly from the artifacts before him, rather than trying to apply secret knowledge from arcane ancient and contemporary manuscripts to the objects in order to try and produce a result, like other scholars of his time, such as Girolamo Ruscelli (who had his own Accademia Segreta).

When Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale was being printed in 1599, and more people knew about the pietism, and beliefs in magical properties of some items in some cabinets of wonder, Imperato’s son, Francesco, feared his father’s text might lead to heresy charges.  Francesco thus quickly printed another shorter version of his father’s text with many references to saints and Christian writers.

Imperato was not charged by the Church with heresy or sorcery when his full text, in all 28 books, came out, and this text became the first to feature an illustration of a cabinet of wonder, and the first work on natural history completely written in Italian (rather than scholarly Latin).

An experiment with asbestos, from Ferranto Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale (1599). Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

Interesting Facts:

Some of the scholars and knowledgeable men with whom Ferrante Imperato corresponded included: Ulisse Aldovrandi, Gaspard Bauhin, Pierandrea Mattioli, and Fabio Colona.

Imperato was amazed by asbestos, which was a relatively new substance at the time, with paradoxical and malleable qualities.  Imperato experimented with asbestos and included an illustration of one of his experiments with it in Dell’historia Naturale (fig. 18)–the only experiment depicted in the work.

In order to argue that a toad’s skull was actually a stone unlike any other natural stones, Imperato captured a pregnant viper and gathered many toads to prove that the viper could not penetrate the toad’s skull, and called the toad’s skull “toadstone” (pietra di rospo).

In 1611, Galileo demonstrated for other scholars the luminescent nature of a stone called the “Bologna stone” (lapis Bononiensis), or the “solar sponge”.  When Imperato heard about this stone, he was fascinated but thought it qualified as natural magic and claimed: “I believe that it is not natural but artificial”.

Cabinets of wonder often included fossils–Imperato had many–and humanist debate in Italy in the early fifteenth century led to subsequent discussions about what the existence of fossils meant; European students visiting Italy spread this debate throughout many regions when they returned to their home towns.

Ferrante Imperato’s Dell’historia Naturale contains medical folklore such as the ideas that wearing amethyst in the navel prevents drunkenness, sapphire cleans the eyes in such a way as to prevent lust, and jasper worn as an amulet can stop bleeding.

References:

Dion, M. (n.d.). History of the wunderkammern (cabinet of curiosities). Mark Dion: Tate Thames Dig. Retrieved from http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/mark-dion-tate-thames-dig/wunderkammen

Duffin, C.J., Moody, R.T.J., & Gardner-Thorpe, C. (Eds.). (2013). A history of geology and medicine. Geological Society: Special Publication, 375, 23-24.

Findlen, P. (1994). Possessing nature: Museums, collecting, and scientific culture in Early Modern Italy. Berkeley, C.A.: University of California Press.

Grice, G. (2015). Cabinet of curiosities: Collecting and understanding the wonders of the natural world. New York, N.Y.: Workman Publishing.

Guitard, E. (1937). Ferrante Imperato. Revue d’histoire de la pharmacie, 25(100), 196.

Mottana, A. (n.d). The first modern translation of Theophrastus’ “On Stones” (pi epsilon rho Anot sign lambda AI omega I1/2; De lapidibus): Ferrante Imperato (1599). Rendiconti Lincei-Scienze Fisiche E Naturali, 21(1), 1-25.

Philippe, J. (2003). Les curiosités de trois apothicaires. Revue d’histoire de la pharmacie, 91(340), 603-610.

Rosenberg, G.D. (Ed.). (2009). The revolution in geology from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment. GSA Memoir Series, 203, 84.

Vai, G. B., & Cavazza, W. (2006). Ulisse Aldrovandi and the origin of geology and science. The origins of geology in Italy: GSA special papers, 411, 43-63.