Credit: © The Royal Society
Image number: RS.10023
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‘The White Eye-Lid Monkey’ [Mangabey]
Date
1790
Creator
James Sowerby (1757 - 1822, British) , Painter
Object type
Library reference
Tracts/X51/10
Material
Technique
Dimensions
height (print): 266mm
width (print): 212mm
width (print): 212mm
Subject
Content object
Description
Zoological study, probably the Collared mangabey Cercocebus torquatus, native to Central Africa [although the author attributes this to the East Indies]. The monkey is posed as if about to climb a tree. A second specimen is shown in the background.
Plate 4 from the book Speculum Linnaeanum: or Linnean zoology; containing a complete illustration of the zoological part of the Systema Naturae of Linnaeus...by George Shaw, the figures by James Sowerby (London, 1790). The mangabey is described in the text: “One of the principal distinctive marks of this Monkey is the white colour of the eye-lids. It is about the size of an Italian greyhound...The general colour of this animal is a sort of subserruginous black; the limbs somewhat darker than the rest of the body. The tail is long and black.”
Plate 4 from the book Speculum Linnaeanum: or Linnean zoology; containing a complete illustration of the zoological part of the Systema Naturae of Linnaeus...by George Shaw, the figures by James Sowerby (London, 1790). The mangabey is described in the text: “One of the principal distinctive marks of this Monkey is the white colour of the eye-lids. It is about the size of an Italian greyhound...The general colour of this animal is a sort of subserruginous black; the limbs somewhat darker than the rest of the body. The tail is long and black.”
Associated place