Credit: ©The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.14134

    Shell and fossil specimens

    Date
    1776
    Creator
    Peter Brown (1758 - 1799, British) , Illustrator
    Object type
    Library reference
    55207
    Material
    Dimensions
    height (print): 199mm
    width (print): 270mm
    Subject
    Content object
    nature
       > landscape
          > shell
    Description
    Conchological study of ten shell and fossil types. Includes, in some cases, depictions of their external and internal surfaces.

    Figure one – The mantle of a Scallop (Pectinidae)
    Figure two – The hinge of a Fossilised Oyster (Gryphaeidae)
    Figure three – A Terebratula Fossil
    Figure four – A Spiny Oyster (Spondylus gaederopus), listed as a ‘Thorny Oyster’
    Figure five – A ‘Studded Coneus’ Fossil
    Figure six – A Pectinoid Mollusc (Pectinoidea unverified), listed as Pectinoides
    Figure seven – An Anomia Bivalve (Anomiidae), taken from Pedro Francisco Davila’s Catalogue systématique et raisonné des curiosités de la nature et de l'art (1767)
    Figures eight, nine and twelve – A Cockle (Cardiidae)
    Figure ten – A Multarticulare Anomia Bivalve (Anomiidae)
    Figure eleven – The Tulip Shell (Fasciolaria tulipa)

    Plate six from Emanuel Mendes da Costa’s book, Elements of conchology: or, an introduction to the knowledge of shells, 1776. Inscribed above: ‘PL. VI’

    Emanuel Mendes da Costa (1717-1791) naturalist was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1747.

    Peter Brown (active 1758-1799) British naturalist and natural history illustrator illustrated Mendes da Costa's Elements of conchology.
    Object history
    Volume donated to the Royal Society by Ronald Winckworth, British natural historian, 1942.
    Related fellows
    Emanuel Mendes da Costa (1717 - 1791) , Naturalist
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