Japan’s 1891 Earthquake

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The Great Earthquake in Japan, 1891 is available on Internet Archive; it was published shortly after the event and includes photographs by K. Ogawa. I picked 6 of them for this blog post. They must have been some of the first pictures of a major earthquake and I wonder how many people saw them around the world. Photography extends the understanding of this type of disaster beyond the people experiencing the destruction more effectively to the general population than written descriptions or drawings.

The Wikipedia article for this earthquake says that this is the still the largest known inland earthquake to have occurred in the Japanese archipelago.

One of the authors of the text, John Milne, had been in Japan since 1876 and had focused on seismology in Japan following an earthquake in February 1880 and initiated what would become the earthquake reporting system of the Japan Meteorological Agency. The 1891 earthquake was well measured because of the proactive work in the decades before it occurred and added to the data in the reporting system allowing for better understanding of aftershocks.

Mesozoic Plants

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The 3 volume Catalogue of the Mesozoic plants in the Department of Geology, British Museum was published between 1894 and 1900…authored by Albert Charles Seward early in his career and earned him membership in the Royal Society at the youthful age of 35. The specimens are from the Wealden beds; the most important finds came from near Hastings. The beds accumulated in a freshwater estuary or lake and include representatives of many plants. The volumes are available on Internet Archive: Vol 1, Vol 2, Vol 3. Seward devoted years to create the catalog: sifting through the fossils…organizing the material…creating images. It was a worthy endeavor and set the trajectory for the rest of his life.

As I browsed these books, I made a game of looking for plants I recognized in the fossils…ferns, conifers, ginkgo-like leaves.

eBotanical Prints – June 2022

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22 botanical print books in June. The topics were wide ranging: Japanese landscape gardening, sweet peas (4 books), roses, conifers (2 books), lawns, wayside trees (4 books), natural history of plants (7 books), and irises. The books were published a 56 year period; 5 have color illustrations.

The whole list of 2,412 botanical eBooks can be accessed here. The list for the June 2022 books with links to the volumes and sample images is at the bottom of this post.

Click on any sample images in the mosaic below to get an enlarged version. Enjoy the June eBotanical Prints!

Supplement to Landscape gardening in Japan * Conder, Josiah; Ogawa, Kengo * sample image * 1893

All about sweet peas * Hutchins, W.T. * sample image * 1894

The modern culture of sweet peas * Stevenson, Thomas * sample image * 1910

Sweet peas and how to grow them * Thomas, Harry Higgott * sample image * 1909

The rose book, a complete guide for amateur rose growers * Thomas, Harry Higgott; Easlea, Walter * sample image * 1914

Field notes of sweet peas * Morse, Lester, L. * sample image * 1916

Illustrations of Conifers - V2 * Clinton-Baker, Henry William * sample image * 1909

Illustrations of Conifers - V3 * Clinton-Baker, Henry William * sample image * 1913

Lawns, and how to make them, together with the proper keeping of putting greens * Barron, Leonard * sample image * 1909

Wayside Trees - Series 1 * Mathews, Ferdinand Shuyler * sample image * 1899

Wayside Trees - Series 2 * Mathews, Ferdinand Shuyler * sample image * 1899

Wayside Trees - Series 3 * Mathews, Ferdinand Shuyler * sample image * 1899

Wayside Trees - Series 4 * Mathews, Ferdinand Shuyler * sample image * 1899

The natural history of plants, their forms, growth, reproduction, and distribution V1 pt 1 * Kerner, Anton Joseph, ritter von Marilaun * sample image * 1896

The natural history of plants, their forms, growth, reproduction, and distribution V2  pt 1 * Kerner, Anton Joseph, ritter von Marilaun * sample image * 1896

The natural history of plants, their forms, growth, reproduction, and distribution V2  pt 2 * Kerner, Anton Joseph, ritter von Marilaun * sample image * 1896

The natural history of plants, their forms, growth, reproduction, and distribution V5 * Kerner, Anton Joseph, ritter von Marilaun * sample image * 1896

The natural history of plants, their forms, growth, reproduction, and distribution V6 * Kerner, Anton Joseph, ritter von Marilaun * sample image * 1896

A handbook of garden irises * Dykes, William Rickatson * sample image * 1924

The genus Iris * Dykes, William Rickatson, Round, F.H. * sample image * 1913

Encyclopédie d'histoire naturelle V1 Bontanique * Chenu, Jean Charles * sample image * 1873

Encyclopédie d'histoire naturelle V2 Bontanique * Chenu, Jean Charles * sample image * 1868

Tomb of Yuaa and Thuiu

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James Edward Quibbell’s book Tomb of Yuaa and Thuiu was published in 1908 and is available on Internet Archive. Yuaa and Thuiu (Yuya and Thuya on Wikipedia) were ancient Egyptian courtiers…parents of Queen Tiye, the Great Royal Wife of Amenhotep III. The tomb was discovered in 1905 and was the best-preserved tomb discovered in the Valley of the Kings before that of Tutankhamun, their great-grandson. Both probably died in their early to mid-50s. Their mummies were largely intact, and the pictures of the faces show the sophistication of the mummification process in preserving the facial features.

Quibbell’s book includes many photographs of the contents of the tomb. He documented the find with many photographs very quickly after the initial discovery just as Carter would later do for the Tut tomb. Certainly, these finds and the documentation of them initially and over the years since, has increased the interest in ancient Egypt.

The initial publications may not be a starting point for learning about these finds now that there are books with color photographs of the artifacts, but they do provide insight from the historical perspective of the men that made the discoveries…and how much they learned from the excavation and first look at the artifacts. They are well worth browsing!

Morris’ A History of British Birds

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The 8 volumes of A History of British Birds by Francis Orpen Morris are available on Internet Archive. I enjoyed browsing the images this past spring. I’ve selected an image from each book to share in this post.

(vol 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Volume 6 included two birds seen frequently in North America: the coot and the Canada goose.

Volume 7 included the Great Auk which was probably extinct – or near extinct – by the time the books were published in 1862. There were some birds – such as the swallow (volume 2) and the cormorant (volume 8)– that had generic entries.

Morris was an Irish clergyman – a ‘parson-naturalist’ of the 1800s; his professional role accommodated his natural history interests. According to the Wikipedia entry about him, he was a pioneer of the movement to protect birds from the plume trade…refused to accept the theory of evolution.

Clarence Brookfield Moore and Burial Mounds

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Clarence Brookfield Moore’s I. Mounds and cemeteries of the lower Arkansas River. Part II. Mounds of the lower Yazoo and lower Sunflower Rivers, Mississippi was published in 1908; it is available on Internet Archive. I enjoyed the illustrations of pottery from the book.

According to Wikipedia, Moore ran the company he inherited from his father for about a decade then turned its management over to others so he could pursue his archeological interests primarily in the southeastern United States. Many of his excavations were of burial mounds; his methods were to the standards of the time…and he did publish…but today the way he handled the mounds/graves would be problematic.

Howard Carter’s The tomb of Tut'Ankh'Amen

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The 1923 book published by the Howard Carter after his discovery of the intact tomb in November 1922 focused on the search, discovery, and clearing of the antechamber…and is available from Internet Archive: The tomb of Tut'Ankh'Amen. I’ve selected several photos from the book. It is interesting to see the jumble of items packed into the tomb shortly after it was opened.

There are two other volumes published in 1927 (burial chamber and mummy) and 1933 (treasury and annex) according to the Wikipedia entry for Carter. Hopefully they will become available as the copyright expires.

eBotanical Prints – May 2022

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The 20 botanical books in May included 4 series:

  • Oakes Ames’ orchids (continued from April) from the early 1900s

  • Flora of the Lesser Antilles from the 1970s and 1980s

  • 2 issues of a magazine about rural art and taste from the 1800s

There were also two themes:

  • Pines

  • Oaks

The whole list of 2,390 botanical eBooks can be accessed here. The list for the May 2022 books with links to the volumes and sample images is at the bottom of this post.

Click on any sample images in the mosaic below to get an enlarged version. Enjoy the May eBotanical Prints!

Orchidaceae: illustrations and studies of the family Orchidaceae - fascicle 3 * Ames, Oakes * sample image * 1908

Orchidaceae: illustrations and studies of the family Orchidaceae - fascicle 4 * Ames, Oakes * sample image * 1910

Orchidaceae: illustrations and studies of the family Orchidaceae - fascicle 6 * Ames, Oakes * sample image * 1920

Orchidaceae: illustrations and studies of the family Orchidaceae - fascicle 7 * Ames, Oakes * sample image * 1920

Flora of the Lesser Antilles : Leeward and Windward Islands V1 - Orchidaceae * Howard, Richard A.; Garay, Lesley A.; Sweet; Herman R. * sample image * 1974

Flora of the Lesser Antilles : Leeward and Windward Islands V2 - Pteridophyta * Howard, Richard A.; Proctor, George R.  * sample image * 1977

Flora of the Lesser Antilles : Leeward and Windward Islands V3 - Monocotyledoneae * Howard, Richard A.; Gould, Frank W.; Koyama, Tetsuo; Maas, Paul J. M.; Read, Robert W.; Thompson-Mills, Brooke (editor) * sample image * 1979

Flora of the Lesser Antilles : Leeward and Windward Islands V4 - Dicotyledoneae (1) * Howard, Richard A.; Kellogg, Elizabeth S.; Staples, George W.; Al-Shehbaz, Ihsan; Anderson, William R.; Plowman, Timothy * sample image * 1988

Flora of the Lesser Antilles : Leeward and Windward Islands V5 - Dicotyledoneae (2) * Howard, Richard A.; Bornstein, Allan J.  * sample image * 1988

Flora of the Lesser Antilles : Leeward and Windward Islands V6 - Dicotyledoneae (3) * Howard, Richard A. * sample image * 1989

The Complete Library of the Garden, V 3 * Bloom, Alan * sample image * 1963

The family herbal * Hill, John * sample image * 1812

How to find and name wild flowers being a new method of observing and identifying upwards of 1,200 species of flowering plants in the British isles * Fox, Thomas * sample image * 1906

The Horticulturist and journal of rural art and rural taste V28, 1873 * Williams, Henry T. * sample image * 1873

The Horticulturist and journal of rural art and rural taste V29, 1874 * Williams, Henry T. * sample image * 1874

The Pines of Mexico * Shaw, George Russell * sample image * 1909

The Genus Pinus * Shaw, George Russell * sample image * 1914

Historic American Trees * Nicholson, Katharine Stanley * sample image * 1922

British oak galls * Connold, Edward T.  * sample image * 1908

The oak : a popular introduction to forest botany * Ward, Harry Marshall * sample image * 1892

Frederick Catherwood’s Lithographs of Maya Art

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I enjoyed browsing 2 publications available via Internet Archive by John L. Stephens with Frederick Catherwood engravings earlier this year. When they were published in the mid1800s, these publications were best sellers and introduced the ancient Maya to the rest of the world. The Wikipedia entry for Catherwood  indicates that he died in 1854 when the ship he was on from Liverpool to New York sank after colliding with another ship. He was 55 years old.

Incidents Of Travel In Central America, Chiapas, And Yucatan V1 and Incidents Of Travel In Central America, Chiapas, And Yucatan V2 from 1841

Another resource for Catherwood lithographs is an online exhibit created in the fall of 2005 with interpretive text by students of a Smith College seminar (“Making Sense of the Pre-Columbian”) for 25 lithographs.

Milne and LeMair

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I discovered an edition of A.A. Milne’s A Gallery of Children with illustrations by Henriette Willibeek LeMair (Saida) – one of my favorite illustrators of the era. It was published in 1925 and is available from Project Gutenberg. I picked three illustrations from the book to include with this post…but follow the link to the book to find many more.

She was most active as an illustrator in the early 1900s. I posted about 4 books she illustrated back in August 2021.  It was a thrill to find another. According to her entry in Wikipedia, in 1920 she married and converted to Sufism…publishing sporadically thereafter.

Tenants of an Old Farm (eBook)

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I enjoyed Henry Christopher McCook’s books available on Internet Archive this past winter. My favorite is Tenants of an Old Farm first published in 1884 (the version in Internet Archive was a revised version published in 1902 so it must have been a relatively popular book during his lifetime). I’ve selected three illustrations from the book – there are more in the book…worth browsing.

McCook was a Presbyterian clergyman that ‘spent his summers studying ants and spiders’ according to his Wikipedia entry. Evidently many of McCook’s nature books were illustrated but Daniel Carter Beard (founder of the Boy Scouts of America); he is mentioned in the author’s preface as providing the ‘comical adaptations’ for the book but the illustrators were Edward Shepard and Frank Stout.

eBotanical Prints – April 2022

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20 additional botanical print books browsed in April and added to the list. The list has quite a variety this month; the last two books on the list (about orchids) are part of a series of books; the rest will be on the May list. The publication dates have quite a range (1776 - 1926)….more drawings than color.

The whole list of 2,370 botanical eBooks can be accessed here. The list for the April 2022 books with links to the volumes and sample images is at the bottom of this post.

Click on any sample images in the mosaic below to get an enlarged version. Enjoy the April eBotanical Prints!

Voyage a la nouvelle Guinée * Sonnerate, Pierre * sample image * 1776

Collection de planches pour servir au Voyage aux Indes Orientales et a la Chine * Sonnerate, Pierre * sample image * 1806

Jagttagelser over vextriget i Marokko. Observations sur le règne végétal au Maroc * Schousboe, Peder Kofod Anker; Betherand, Emile Louis; Lang, Joh * sample image * 1874

Le grand jardin de l'univers V1 (1785) * Buc'hoz, Pierre-Joseph * sample image * 1785

Herbier colorié de l'Amerique * Buc'hoz, Pierre-Joseph * sample image * 1783

Illustrations of Himalayan plants * Cathcart, John Fergusson; Fitch, W.H.; Hoooker, Joseph Dalton * sample image * 1855

A second century of ferns * Hooker, William Jackson; Fitch, W.H. * sample image * 1861

Illustrations of the forest flora of North-West and central India * Stewart, J. Lindsay; Fitch, W.H. * sample image * 1874

Illustrations of the British flora: a series of wood engravings, with dissections, of British plants  * Fitch, Walter Hood * sample image * 1908

Illustrations of the principal natural orders of the vegetable kingdom * Oliver, Daniel; Fitch, Walter Hood * sample image * 1874

A handbook of flowering trees and shrubs for gardeners * Notcutt, R.C.; Dykes, William Ricatson * sample image * 1926

Our ferns in their haunts, a guide to all the native species * Clute, Willard Nelson * sample image * 1901

The fern allies of North America north of Mexico * Clute, Willard Nelson; Clute, Ida Martin * sample image * 1905

The romance of our trees * Wilson, Ernest Henry * sample image * 1920

Aristocrats of the Garden * Wilson, Ernest Henry * sample image * 1917

Root and stem vegetables * Dean, Alexander * sample image * 1910

Roses, their history, development and cultivation * Pemberton, Joseph Hardwick * sample image * 1908

The Rose in America * McFarland, John Horace * sample image * 1923

Orchidaceae: illustrations and studies of the family Orchidaceae - fascicle 1 * Ames, Oakes * sample image * 1905

Orchidaceae: illustrations and studies of the family Orchidaceae - fascicle 2 * Ames, Oakes * sample image * 1905

Egyptian Mummies

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Sir Grafton Elliott Smith’s Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire N° 61051-61100 The Royal Mummies was published in 1912 and reflects the knowledge/assumptions from that time. I had never seen so many photographs of mummies presented in one book! Some of the mummies were very damaged – by looters or deliberate desecration in antiquity, poor quality of embalming, ravages of time, or damage occurring when the wrappings were removed. It’s awe inspiring to see remains that are so old…yet realize that they still are recognizably human. I selected 4 sample images from the book that is available on Internet Archive…enjoy more by following the link to the book directly.

Ancient Egypt has been a topic that has held my interest since my elementary school years – part of my first exposure to world history. So much has been explored and published…and yet there are still new finds in the country; I always scan the article that show up in my news feeds about ancient Egypt. This older publication demonstrated to me that there are nuggets in the documents that are over 100 years old!

The Early Christian Monuments of Scotland (eBook)

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Internet Archive has the 3 volumes of The Early Christian monuments of Scotland by John Romilly Allen and Joseph Anderson published in 1903 presented in two volumes: The Early Christian monuments of Scotland V1-2 and The Early Christian monuments of Scotland V3.

I enjoyed browsing them (particularly volumes 1-2) from a Zentangle pattern perspective. The patterns looked familiar with many variations of several presented in the book. Now that I am looking at the book again as I write this post…if feel a Zentangle project calling…maybe several. First up – tiles prompted by the ‘spiral ornament’ pages!

The Birds of California (Dawson/Brooks)

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The Birds of California was published in 4 volumes in 1923. The author was William Leon Dawson with illustrations by Allan Brooks. There are some of Dawson’s photographs used as illustrations as well. Follow these links to see the eBooks: V1, V2, V3, V4. I selected a sample image from each book below.

Two aspects to keep in mind with a work of this vintage:

  • A lot has happened to California in the almost 100 years since the volumes were published. The habitat for some of the birds has probably succumbed to development or is degraded by pollution. Undoubtedly some of the birds are endangered…maybe a few are gone entirely.

  • Classification of birds is always changing. Some of these older books have birds as separate species that are now considered  single species. The advent of DNA analysis for classification is the most recent perturbation.

But these don’t detract at all from enjoying the illustrations!

eBotanical Prints – March 2022

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20 botanical print books browsed in March and added to the list. The month continued the browsing of Refugium Botanicum volumes that I started in February. The publication dates are all from the mid-1800s (1851-1872)….and lots of color rather than drawings.

The whole list of 2,350 botanical eBooks can be accessed here. The list for the March 2022 books with links to the volumes and sample images is at the bottom of this post.

Click on any sample images in the mosaic below to get an enlarged version. Enjoy the March eBotanical Prints!

Refugium botanicum V3 * Saunders, William Wilson; Baker, John Gilbert; Fitch, W. H. * sample image * 1870

Refugium botanicum V4 * Saunders, William Wilson; Baker, John Gilbert; Fitch, W. H. * sample image * 1869

Refugium botanicum V5 * Saunders, William Wilson; Baker, John Gilbert; Fitch, W. H. * sample image * 1869

L'Horticulteur Francais 1851 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1851

L'Horticulteur Francais 1852 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1852

L'Horticulteur Francais 1854 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1854

L'Horticulteur Francais 1855 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1855

L'Horticulteur Francais 1856 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1856

L'Horticulteur Francais 1858 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1858

L'Horticulteur Francais 1860 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1860

L'Horticulteur Francais 1862 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1862

L'Horticulteur Francais 1865 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1865

L'Horticulteur Francais 1866 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1866

L'Horticulteur Francais 1867 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1867

L'Horticulteur Francais 1868 * Henricq, Francois * sample image * 1868

Flore médicale usuelle et industrielle du XIXe siècle T2 * Dupuis, Aristide; Reveil, Oscar; Baillon, Henri * sample image * 1872

Flore médicale usuelle et industrielle du XIXe siècle T1 * Dupuis, Aristide; Reveil, Oscar; Baillon, Henri * sample image * 1870

Flore médicale usuelle et industrielle du XIXe siècle T3 * Dupuis, Aristide; Reveil, Oscar; Baillon, Henri * sample image * 1872

Horticulture: végétaux d'ornement * Dupuis, Aristide; Henrincq, Francois * sample image * 1871

Horticulture: Jardin potager et jardin fruitier * Henricq, Francois; Gerard, Frederic * sample image * 1872

A. A. Milne Books (and not Winnie-the-Pooh)

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I browsed 3 books written by A. A. Milne from the early 1920s available on Project Gutenberg and Internet Archive last month. They were all before the Winnie-the-Pooh books although two of them contain material that later became part of the books that made Milne famous.  

A Gallery of Children illustrated by H. Willebeek Le Mair (1925) is my favorite of the group because of the illustrator. I posted about 4 other books she illustrated by in August 2021; she’s one of my favorite illustrators of the early 1900s.

Once Upon a Time illustrated by Charles Robinson (1922) was written in 1915…before the birth of Christopher Robin at a time when ‘life was not very amusing.’ It was published at the end of 1917. Milne commented that ‘I am still finding it difficult to explain just what sort of book it is.’

When we were very young (1924) is dedicated to Christopher Robin Milne (or Billy Moon as he prefers to call himself). He was born in 1920. The Internet Archive book does not include illustrator’s name; the A. A. Milne entry in Wikipedia lists E.H. Shepard (Punch cartoonist).

Andrew Lang’s Fairy Books (on Internet Archive)

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I’ve enjoyed browsing 8 books from the color series of Fairy Books attributed to Andrew Lang and illustrated by Henry Justice Ford this March. Lang credited his wife, Leonora Blanche Lang, with translating and transcribing most of the stories in the collections; it’s heartening that he publicly acknowledged her contribution since other women were given no credit at all for their authorship during the late 1800s/early 1900s when these books were published.  According to Wikipedia: “The Langs' collections did much to shift (the) public perception of fairy stories as unsuitable for children and unworthy of critical analysis.” Enjoy the 8 sample images….and browse some of these books!

The Orange Fairy Book - The Violet Fairy Book - The Green Fairy Book - The Brown Fairy Book

The Pink Fairy Book - The Yellow Fairy Book - The Grey Fairy Book - The Olive Fairy Book

There are more Lang Fairy Books to explore on Internet Archive….outside the color series. Evidently there were 25 Lang fairy collections published between 1889 and 1913!

Bani Hasan Part IV from the Egypt Exploration Fund

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Bani Hasan Part IV was published in 1893 by the Egypt Exploration Fund. It is a small volume (82 pages) available on Internet Archive as are some of the other volumes in the series…but this one was my favorite. It includes ancient Egyptian depictions of birds and animals as well as activities of daily life. I’ve selected 4 sample images from the volume.

I learned from the Wikipedia entry that:

  • Beni Hasan is an ancient Egyptian cemetery that spans the 21st and 17th centuries BCE…primarily the Middle Kingdom of ancient Egypt. The tombs are famous for the quality of their paintings.

  • Howard Carter (famous for discovering Tutankhamun’s tomb) spent a season there in 1891 as a teenager – producing watercolors of the tomb paintings. (He is listed on the title page of this book along with others.)

  • The paintings are now in poor condition.

Gladys Davidson Weinberg and Archaeology (magazine)

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Internet Archive has more than half the Archaeology magazines edited by Gladys Davidson Weinberg: her tenure as editor was from 1952-1967 and Internet Archive has the editions up to 1961. The images in the magazine are mostly black and white photographs. There is a sample image from each year below and links to the 4 volumes from each year after the images.

According to Wikipedia - Dr. Weinberg received her PhD from Johns Hopkins in 1935…her dissertation about excavations at Corinth. She married in 1942 to another academic….managing to continue her career. She and her husband were associated with the University of Missouri from 1948 onward. It would be interesting to track the timeline of her career and her husband’s. There were not a lot of women in the 1940s and 1950s (and even beyond that) that were able to continue an academic career – particularly in the same department as their husband. She evidently was active in her field for the rest of her life (she lived 92 years)!