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1 of 253523 objects
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia; volume 1 1875-88
RCIN 1122354
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
After John Gould (1804-81)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe 1875-88
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John Gould was born in Lyme Regis on the Dorset coast in 1804 but was brought up in Surrey and later Windsor, where his father was one of the gardeners at the castle. The young Gould taught himself taxidermy from an early age and soon established a skill for the craft. Following a brief 18-month stint as gardener at Ripley Hall in Yorkshire, in 1824, he moved to London to establish a shop in the city.
The taxidermy enterprise was a successful one and Gould counted important public figures, including George IV (for whom he stuffed a pet giraffe in 1826), among his clients. In 1828, he won a competition to become taxidermist at the museum of the Zoological Society of London and eventually became the curator of the museum where he developed connections with some of the most prominent naturalists of the day and received specimens from around the world to preserve and prepare for display. He was also noted for his own knowledge of ornithology and in 1836 assisted Charles Darwin in understanding the specimens collected from the Beagle voyage to the Galapagos, demonstrating that the birds collected were not different species as Darwin initially thought, but varieties of the same species, thus inspiring his revolutionary theory of natural selection.
Gould began to publish fine ornithological volumes from 1830. They are among the most famous and important 'bird-books' of the nineteenth century and the volumes in the Royal Library were subscribed to by Prince Albert and Queen Victoria.
Later in life, Gould worked on publishing volumes on the spectacularly diverse birds of New Guinea. Birds of Paradise are included in astounding detail but Gould died before the work, and another mammoth seven-volume work on the birds of Asia begun in 1850, could be finished. The remaining text was completed by Richard Bowdler Sharpe.
The King Bird of Paradise (Cicinnurus Regius) has its main habitat in New Guinea but is also found in the Molucca islands, an archipelago within Indonesia. Its startling courtship display involves hanging upside down and swinging like a pendulum.Provenance
Acquired by Queen Victoria on the book's publication in 1875
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Alternative title(s)
The Birds of New Guinea and the adjacent Papuan Islands, including many new species recently discovered in Australia ; v. 1 / by John Gould ; completed after the authors death by R. Bowdler Sharpe.
