Credit: © The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.8428
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    Cork and part of a sensitive plant

    Date
    1665
    Creator
    Unknown, Engraver
    After
    Robert Hooke (1635 - 1703, British) , Natural Philosopher
    Object type
    Library reference
    RCN 45230
    Material
    Technique
    Dimensions
    height (print): 305mm
    width (print): 200mm
    Subject
    Physics
       > Optics
          > Microscopy
    Biology
    Content object
    nature
       > plant
    Description
    Microscopic study of two specimens: Fig. 1. cork and Fig. 2. a sprig from a sensitive plant, Mimosa pudica.

    Inscribed above: ‘Schem XI’

    Written in the associated text: ‘examining it [the cork] very diligently with a Microscope, me thought I could perceive it to appear a little porous; but I could not so plainly distinguish them, as to be sure that they were pores, much less what Figure they were of […]’

    Plate 11 from Robert Hooke’s Micrographia: or some physiological descriptions of minute bodies made by magnifying glasses with observations and inquiries thereupon (1665), the first fully-illustrated book on the topic of microscopy. In the preface Hooke asserts that he had discovered ‘a new visible World’.

    Robert Hooke (1635-1703) British natural philosopher was a founding member of the Royal Society, elected in 1663. Before his career with the Royal Society, Hooke had been apprenticed to painter Peter Lely (1618-1680), where he learned to draw and paint. Though he did not engrave the images in Micrographia himself they were engraved after his illustrations.
    Associated place
    <The World>
       > Europe
          > United Kingdom
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