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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mb1848" data-source="post: 1672201" data-attributes="member: 31036">"a collection of about 150 watercolors and oilpaintings, showing virtually all of Marcgraves birds, which were bound together in 6 volumes and were housed in the former "Prussian State Library" (now Berlin State Library) in Berlin until the end of WWII, since when they are missing. About 800,000 volumes from this library alone were brought to the former Soviet Union as part of so called "Beutekunst" (trophy art), but whether Marcgraves paintings still exist in some Russian art depot, or were destroyed during war, is apparently unknown."Not so, "The watercolors and oil paintings eventually were deposited in the Preussiche Staatsbibliothek in Berlin and catalogued as Libri picturuti A (two volumes of watercolors and four volumes of oil paintings). These were the originals examined by Lichtenstein (1817, 1823) and by Schneider (1938). In 1941, the paintings were evacuated to Silesia and were not seen or heard of until rediscovered in Poland in 1977 (Whitehead 1979b, 1982). They are now in the Jagiellon Library in Cracow, Poland."  There are copies from Leningrad but they are from at least the early 1800s.Sorry to beat a dead horse but I am changing my mind."the names of all birds were written directly on the plates in what appears to be Marcgraves handwriting"  I think this is unlikely and perhaps unknowable but more modern research into the drawings and paintings do not think this is Marcgraves handwriting. Marcgraves was competitive with “Bill” Piso and so wrote in code.  So cautious was Marcgrave that some things were written in a second cipher. E.W. Gudger a keen student of Marcgraves in the early 20th Century believed that the “marginal notes on the original paintings are presumably those of Count Johann Moritz.”Marcgrave wrote notes supposedly in German and there are Dutch, and Latin writings on the Leningrad collection.  Early researchers believed that the Berlin watercolors were the originals of Marcgrave but now they are considered copies. I think it is unknowable if Marcgrave wrote on the Berlin collection of drawings and paintings.  So again they have no direct taxonomic relevance.   I think the Marcgrave description and drawing is of the Yellow-headed Caracara.   Is it so strange that the paintings and drawings from approximately 1630 made by Europeans of the harrier and caracara in Dutch Brazil would look generally alike?  In addition, is it so strange that the people who made the colored woodcut (?) of Caracara might choose to use a very similar form to the watercolor of the Long-winged Harrier?  It probably saved energy and time.  Actually the Marcgrave & Piso book put together by deLaet did not use woodcuts it is early copper engraving.  Piso’s book from 1658 which is a mash up of Piso & Marcgrave with other information uses woodcuts and the illustrations are much worse. Grudger in his article Georg Marcgrave a Postscript lists the engraver as de Bray which I am sure is the sons of Theodor de Bry. Europe’s best natural history engravers?  Is it so strange that the Tupi native people called the Harrier and the Caracara similar or the same names?  In Piso & Marcgrave is a bird called Cariçara the black-faced ibis Theristicus melanopis . Some of the engravings in the Marcgrave 1648 book were from a book by de Laet published in 1640.  (Paratrygon aiereba (Muller & Heinle 1841) the senior synonym of the freshwater stingray Revista Brasileira De Zoologia (1991).) Marcgraves did not oversee the production of the printed book of 1648 because he died in Africa.  Marcgrave was described as someone who could have become the Aristotle of his age a great scientist.  Albert Eckhout (painter of the 300+bird oil paintings?) was a great painter but not a great observer of nature and scientist as was Marcgrave?  Prince Maurice/Moritz etc had wild animals brought to his garden in Brazil where Eeckhout drew things but Marcgraves went out in the wilds with soldiers.  The colored Caracara in Piso & Marcgrave 1648 matches the description from the book.  In addition, the description does not match the harrier picture.  I am a lawyer and we often look at intent to guide us.  What was the intent of the engraver and colorist of the Caracara in Marcgrave 1648?  Did they intend to make a representation of a harrier? No. If he or she had, it would have been easy with a few strokes to draw the facial disk.  He or she did not.  The harrier picture is hearsay, it is not in the taxonomic literature.  It is not inherently reliable evidence. “Several species of cephalopods occur along the Brazilian coasts, but none are recorded by Marcgrave (in Piso & Marcgrave) This is especially remarkable because among the collections of animal pictures of Johan Maurits, there were available to De Laet at least two representing cephalopods.  Judging by copies in the Leningrad archives these may be identified…This seems to confirm the suspicion that De Laet did not use all Marcgrave’s notes for his Historia text. Perhaps for the same reason the coelenterates are missing in Marcgraves book.”  So the harrier watercolor was from some notes of Marcgrave that confused deLaet or he simply did not put it into the book. Or it  may have not even been from Marcgrave, the research into the Leningrad copies and the original copes of the Dutch Brazil paintings from Berlin shows paintings and drawing from unknown sources sneaked into this collection.    In Grudger's 1912 Biography of Marcgraves he quotes Schnieder from 1786 saying “I have so often heard of a collection of original paintings of Brazilian animals which Prince Johann Moritz of Nassau formerly governor of the one time Dutch Brazil, had made and had annotated in his own handwriting and… given to the great Elector of Brandenberg…all the sheets are designated by numbers, however without a perfect arrangement having been brought about in the two different banded separated the one from the other…By comparing them with (the figures in) Marcgrave’s Natural History of Brazil it is plainly shown that Marcgrave had all the best painted figures copied as woodcuts in the same size.  How faithfully! Thereon we have his own word.  The added remarks are in Dutch and we know certainly by the Prince’s own hand, and everywhere agree with Marcgraves text.  However they are extremely brief and indicate only the sizes and relationships of the animals with one another.  The collection itself may no longer be complete, at any rate I have in vain sought therein for some of Marcgrave’s sketches, however there are to be sure some sketches which Marcgraves did not copy, and some few animals which he did not know.  In the main I note that on careful comparison this collection explains Marcgraves text in general.  This also can not be in error since Marcgrave has only been able to afford woodcuts, and his draughtsman has not seldom copied the original figures entirely wrong; in the annotated collection on the contrary all the animals have their natural colors whose differentiation so often must give the essential points of distinction between nearly related species and genera.Bloch in 1788 describes this collection of drawings as made on white parchment and consisting of two sets. “The first contains …87 birds…in all 183 sheets.  On each (sheet) is a figure of a fish, bird…All are very beautifully designed and painted in part with very bright and beautiful colors.  Above the animal one finds the name which it bears in Brazil, and below mention is often made in the Dutch language of its size.  The second part also on white parchment…contains two quadrupeds, 15 birds…it consists of 114 sheets on which one finds the designs mentioned which have been made by the same hand as those of the first part.Along with the preceding lot of drawings in the Royal Library of Berlin is a large number of oil paintings bearing the title: Theatrum rerum Naturalium Brasiliae. (Icones) in 4 Banden Libri picturati …In 1717 an anonymous author notes that these oil paintings are in four banden and that the first are 357 fishes in the second 303 birds…1460 in all.” He refers to a smaller collection of watercolors but does not give the number.  Lichenstein tells us in 1811 Illiger brought these to the attention of the modern scientific world. (!!!???)  Boeseman, M. et al., 1990. Seventeenth century drawings of Brazilian animals in Leningrad.— Zool. Verh., Leiden, 267:1-189,43 (partly coloured) pis.<a href="http://www.repository.naturalis.nl/document/149096" target="_blank">http://www.repository.naturalis.nl/document/149096</a> . (large file, save file as) <a href="http://www.jstor.org/pss/20104320" target="_blank">http://www.jstor.org/pss/20104320</a>  .•  A Note on the Spiny Lobster Described by Marcgrave in His Historia Naturalis Brasiliae (1648) •  Marcio L. Vianna •  Crustaceana, Vol. 53, No. 3 (Nov., 1987) <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=a5CYQFGkV6wC&pg=PT241&lpg=PT241&dq=Libri+principis+Marcgrave&source=bl&ots=rEhhLO9MQc&sig=sdbphN1iTNTxZwhdr7lGHV6Xvos&hl=en&ei=SqIaS9zBOoyCsgOgh8WQBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CBwQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=anteater&f=false" target="_blank">http://books.google.com/books?id=a5CYQFGkV6wC&pg=PT241&lpg=PT241&dq=Libri+principis+Marcgrave&source=bl&ots=rEhhLO9MQc&sig=sdbphN1iTNTxZwhdr7lGHV6Xvos&hl=en&ei=SqIaS9zBOoyCsgOgh8WQBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CBwQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=anteater&f=false</a>  .Visions of savage paradise: Albert Eckhout, court painter in colonial Dutch Brasil By Rebecca Parker Brienen<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=GmcdV1Lpj9sC&pg=PT19&lpg=PT19&dq=Libri+principis+Marcgrave&source=bl&ots=S5sDc5iXPQ&sig=PEyT9lB0WAYBLhch0BtmRsS18X0&hl=en&ei=jbEaS7M_j9KxA6CvvPwE&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAzgK#v=onepage&q=Libri%20principis%20Marcgrave&f=false" target="_blank">http://books.google.com/books?id=GmcdV1Lpj9sC&pg=PT19&lpg=PT19&dq=Libri+principis+Marcgrave&source=bl&ots=S5sDc5iXPQ&sig=PEyT9lB0WAYBLhch0BtmRsS18X0&hl=en&ei=jbEaS7M_j9KxA6CvvPwE&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAzgK#v=onepage&q=Libri principis Marcgrave&f=false</a> .La distribucion de Tropidacris cristata (orthoptera: Acridoidea) segun la “Historia rerum naturalium Brasiliae: de Georg Marcgrave (1648)The correct name for the Olivaceous Cormorant, “Maiague” of Piso (1658).-<a href="http://www.scricciolo.com/Nuovo_Neornithes/Piso%20-%20p0101-p0106.pdf" target="_blank">http://www.scricciolo.com/Nuovo_Neornithes/Piso - p0101-p0106.pdf</a> .<a href="http://www.euppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.3366/E0260954108000879" target="_blank">http://www.euppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.3366/E0260954108000879</a> .More about the Libri picturati.</blockquote>

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