scholarly journals The Heron-Allen & Earland Type Slide Collection of Foraminifera in the British Museum (Natural History)

1989 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. L. Hodgkinson
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
British Museum ◽  
Background Information ◽  
Mutual Interest ◽  
Reference Collection ◽  
History Of ◽  
Type Slide

Abstract. Heron-Allen & Earland collaborated on the study of the Foraminifera over a period of 25 years. During this partnership they amassed a large faunal reference collection (The Type Slide Collection) which was presented to the British Museum (Natural History) between 1926 and 1943. An introductory biography of Edward Heron-Allen and Arthur Earland shows that they came from very different backgrounds and had very different capabilities, but were united by a mutual interest in foraminifera; their dedication made them the foremost British foraminiferologists of the time. The appearance and content of the collection are described with background information on how these slides were prepared. Heron-Allen & Earland’s own method of curation, using a series of detailed indices (Keys), is also explained. The history of the Type Slide Collection, including its transfer from Selsey to the Museum to save it from destruction, is recounted and its importance, as a national collection, assessed.

Richard Bradley's Relationship With Sir Hans Sloane

1970 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-77 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
Royal Society ◽  
Scientific Literature ◽  
British Museum ◽  
Prolific Author ◽  
Good Picture ◽  
Adverse Conditions ◽  
University Of Cambridge ◽  
History Of ◽  
The University

Sir Hans Sloane (1660-1753) is remembered more for his activities in the spheres of science and medicine than for his original contributions to these fields. His large treatise on the natural history of Jamaica (2 vols., 1707- 1725) and other writings were useful additions to the scientific literature, but they were overshadowed by his activities as President of both the Royal Society (1727-1741) and the Royal College of Physicians (1719-1735) and by his having provided the collections which became the foundation of the British Museum. There is no definitive study on him, but the two recent biographies by De Beer and Brooks provide a good picture of his life and work (1). Sloane carried on a voluminous correspondence, and most of the letters written to him are preserved in the British Museum—largely unpublished (2). Among them are a dozen letters from Richard Bradley (1688?—5 November 1732), which throw somewhat more light on Bradley than on Sloane. They also illustrate the adverse conditions under which men without wealth have sometimes worked when pursuing scientific activities. Bradley was a prolific author of books on agriculture, horticulture, biology, and medicine. As will appear from his letters, he was often the pawn of booksellers, and John Martyn (1699-1768), his malicious rival, commented shortly after his death that ‘The booksellers have lost a good easy pad’ (3). Bradley was at times only a popularizer or a hack, but he also produced writings having scientific merit (4). Furthermore, he was a Fellow of the Royal Society and the first Professor of Botany at the University of Cambridge. His correspondence with Sloane is therefore of interest for adding to our knowledge of both men and the scientific activities of their time.

V.—Palæontology in Germany and Austria

1885 ◽  
Vol 2 (12) ◽  
pp. 556-559
Author(s):  
Albert Gaudry
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
British Museum ◽  
History Of

[Note by the Translator.—M. Albert Gaudry, the well-known Professor of Palæontology at the Museum of Natural History of Paris, following up a report which he published last year of a visit to the British Museum (Natural History), Cromwell Road, has recently written an article in the "Revue Scientifique" on a series of visits just paid to the Museums of Germany and elsewhere.This article is valuable, not only for the statement of the existence of a great scientific movement on the Continent, but for the summarised sketch it gives of the most interesting geological and palæontological collections in the principal museums of Europe, a knowledge of which is often desiderated by the student when travelling abroad.—Mark Stirrup.]

scholarly journals I. On the scelidothere ( scelidotherium, leptocephalum , Owen), a large extinct terrestrial sloth

1857 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 312-314
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
Charles Darwin ◽  
British Museum ◽  
Extinct Species ◽  
Northern Patagonia ◽  
History Of ◽  
Osseous System

The extinct species of large terrestrial Sloth, indicated by the above name, was first made known by portions of its fossil skeleton having been discovered by Charles Darwin, Esq., F. R. S., at Punta Alta, Northern Patagonia. These portions were described by the author in the Appendix to the 'Natural History of the Voyage of H. M. S. Beagle'. The subsequent acquisition by the British Museum of the collection of Fossil Mammalia brought from Buenos Ayres by M. Bravard, has given further evidence of the generic distinction of the Scelidothere, and has supplied important characters of the osseous system, and especially of the skull, which the fragments from the hard consolidated gravel of Punta Alta did not afford.

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