Book ID: CBB001552177

The Duchess's Shells: Natural History Collecting in the Age of Cook's Voyages (2014)

unapi

Tobin, Beth Fowkes (Author)


Yale University Press


Publication Date: 2014
Physical Details: xi + 316 pp.; ill.
Language: English

Margaret Cavendish Bentinck, the 2nd Duchess of Portland (1715-1785), was one of the wealthiest women in eighteenth-century Britain. She collected fine and decorative arts (the Portland Vase was her most famous acquisition), but her great love was natural history, and shells in particular. Over the course of twenty years, she amassed the largest shell collection of her time, which was sold after her death in a spectacular auction. Beth Fowkes Tobin illuminates the interlocking issues surrounding the global circulation of natural resources, the commodification of nature, and the construction of scientific value through the lens of one woman's marvelous collection. This unique study tells the story of the collection's formation and dispersal-about the sailors and naturalists who ferried rare specimens across oceans and the dealers' shops and connoisseurs' cabinets on the other side of the world. Exquisitely illustrated, this book brings to life Enlightenment natural history and its cultures of collecting, scientific expeditions, and vibrant visual culture

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Reviewed By

Review Wallace, Elizabeth Kowaleski (2015) Review of "The Duchess's Shells: Natural History Collecting in the Age of Cook's Voyages". American Historical Review (pp. 328-329). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001552177/

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Authors & Contributors
Parsons, Christopher M.
Murphy, Kathleen S.
Bailes, Melissa
Brandie R. Siegfried
Gleadhill, Emma
Weisberg-Roberts, Alicia
Concepts
Natural history
Collectors and collecting
Women in science
Botany
Zoology
Science and literature
Time Periods
18th century
19th century
17th century
20th century, early
16th century
Places
Great Britain
Atlantic world
France
Bath (England)
Tahiti
Atlantic Ocean
Institutions
Royal Society of London
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