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Curiosity Cabinet Poster |
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A901 - Curiosity Cabinet
Cabinets of natural curiosities were the precursors to
modern natural history museums. They were essentially
collections, displayed in cabinets, of interesting specimens
found in nature, including everything from insects to
seashells, to plants to fossils, to monstrosities –
two-headed animals and the like. They began around 1500 in
the courts of Italian princes, but by the following century
they were flourishing – and not just in the courts of
nobility.
Albertus Seba (1665-1736), a Dutch apothecary, had one
of the most extensive collections of natural curiosities in
Europe. He sold his first cabinet of curiosities to Russian
czar, Peter the Great, who used it to start the Russian
Natural History Museum. Items from his later cabinets can
be found in the Zoological Museum in Amsterdam, the British
Museum in London and the Natural History Museum in
Stockholm.
Throughout his life, Seba commissioned artists to draw
all the specimens in his cabinets as they would have
appeared in life. He had them engraved and published them
as a set of folios. This poster was created from those
folios. It's a great tribute to the beginning of natural
history museums of today. |
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