Scarlet cordia, morning glory and Polyphemus moth
Date
1731
Creator
Mark Catesby (1683-1749, British), Naturalist
Object type
Library reference
18894
Material
Technique
Subject
Content object
Description
Botanical study of two plant specimens: scarlet cordia, Cordia sebestena, showing red flowers and green fruits, and morning glory, Ipomoea carolina, shown twined around the stem of the former, with pink flowers. Below, a Polyphemus moth, Antheraea polyphemus, referred to in the associated description as the 'Great Moth', Phalaena ingens.
Plate 91 from volume II of Mark Catesby’s The natural history of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (London, 1731).
Mark Catesby (1683-1749), British naturalist was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1733. Travelling under the auspices of the Royal Society, Catesby recorded the earliest western scientific descriptions of the flora and fauna of the ‘New World’. He was the first naturalist to use folio-sized colour plates in a natural history book, and etched the copper plates himself before hand-colouring each individual print with watercolours.
Plate 91 from volume II of Mark Catesby’s The natural history of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (London, 1731).
Mark Catesby (1683-1749), British naturalist was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1733. Travelling under the auspices of the Royal Society, Catesby recorded the earliest western scientific descriptions of the flora and fauna of the ‘New World’. He was the first naturalist to use folio-sized colour plates in a natural history book, and etched the copper plates himself before hand-colouring each individual print with watercolours.