Credit: © The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.10387
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    Venus’s flower basket

    Date
    1878
    Creator
    Unknown, Photographer
    Object type
    Library reference
    Tracts/X346/2
    Material
    Technique
    Dimensions
    height (print): 171mm
    width (print): 125mm
    height (paper support): 271mm
    width (paper support): 206mm
    Subject
    Content object
    nature
       > animal
    Description
    Study of the sponge Euplectella aspergillum, known as Venus’s flower-basket. The sponge became a novelty and a wedding gift in Victorian England since it was frequently home to a pairing of male and female shrimps.

    Plate from the monograph On Euplectella aspergillum. Also on a new form of globigerina; phosphorescent animalcules..., by William Chimmo (London, Taylor and Francis, 1878). The plate is not inscribed.

    William Chimmo (1828-1891) Royal Navy Captain and hydrographer dredged for these marine creatures off the Philippine Islands.
    Associated place
    <The World>
       > Asia
          > Philippines
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