The Gold-Green Senegalese Blackbird from Buffon's "The Natural History of Birds." Volume 9: "Exotic Birds." 1790. German edition
Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707 – 1788) was a French naturalist, mathematician, cosmologist, and encyclopédiste. His works influenced the next two generations of naturalists. Buffon published thirty-six quarto volumes of his “Histoire Naturelle” during his lifetime; with additional volumes based on his notes and further research being published in the two decades following his death.
It has been said that "Truly, Buffon was the father of all thought in natural history in the second half of the 18th century.” Buffon’s “Histoire Naturelle” was translated into many different languages, making him one of the most widely read authors of the day, a rival to Montesquieu, Rousseau and Voltaire. Arguing that all the world’s quadrupeds had developed from an original set of just thirty-eight quadrupeds, Buffon is sometimes considered a “transformist” and a precursor to Darwin.
[Source: Wikipedia]
The Gold-Green Senegalese Blackbird from Buffon's "The Natural History of Birds." Volume 9: "Exotic Birds." 1790. German edition
Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707 – 1788) was a French naturalist, mathematician, cosmologist, and encyclopédiste. His works influenced the next two generations of naturalists. Buffon published thirty-six quarto volumes of his “Histoire Naturelle” during his lifetime; with additional volumes based on his notes and further research being published in the two decades following his death.
It has been said that "Truly, Buffon was the father of all thought in natural history in the second half of the 18th century.” Buffon’s “Histoire Naturelle” was translated into many different languages, making him one of the most widely read authors of the day, a rival to Montesquieu, Rousseau and Voltaire. Arguing that all the world’s quadrupeds had developed from an original set of just thirty-eight quadrupeds, Buffon is sometimes considered a “transformist” and a precursor to Darwin.
[Source: Wikipedia]