Credit: ©The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.18364

    'White headed ibis'

    Date
    1790
    Creator
    Peter Mazell (1721, Irish) , Engraver
    Object type
    Material
    Technique
    Dimensions
    height (page): 245mm
    width (page): 185mm
    height (print): 195mm
    width (print): 155mm
    Subject
    Content object
    nature
       > animal
          > bird
    Description
    Ornithological study of a painted stork, Mycteria leucocephala, referred to here as Tantalus leucocephalus. Shown in right profile with one leg raised, on a grassy plain by the water's edge.

    Inscribed below: ‘P Mazell Sculp. WHITE HEADED IBIS'

    Written in the associated description: 'The bird was taken in the isle of Ceylon, and kept tame for some time at Colombo; it made a snapping noise with its bill like a stork; and, what was remarkable, its fine rosy feathers lost their color during the rainy season.'

    Plate 11 from Thomas Pennant’s Indian Zoology (London, 1790), printed by Henry Hughs for Robert Faulder.

    Thomas Pennant (1726–1798), British naturalist, traveller, and writer, was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1767. Best known for his published accounts of tours throughout the British Isles. He never travelled outside of Europe and his account of Indian Zoology was gleamed from drawings brought back by Joan Gideon Loten (1710-1789), a servant in the colonies of the Dutch East India Company and 29th Governor of Sri Lanka, then Ceylon.
    Related fellows
    Thomas Pennant (1726 - 1798, British) , Naturalist
    Joan Gideon Loten (1710 - 1789) , Colonial administrator
    Associated place
    <The World>
       > Asia
          > Sri Lanka
    Powered by CollectionsIndex+/CollectionsOnline