Conrad Gessner: Vogelbuch

Conrad Gessner: Vogelbuch

Conrad Gessner (1516–1565) was a Zurich physician, naturalist and philologist. After studying in Bourges and Paris, he worked as a teacher, professor of Greek language and natural history as well as a physician and continually supplemented his livelihood through scholarly writing. What began pragmatically soon became his passion: Until the end of his life, he pursued studies in natural history and even published a geological treatise in the year of his death – he died of the plague in 1565.

Gessner's Magnum Opus

With the Historia animalium, which was intended to bring together all the zoological knowledge of his time, Gessner not only created his personal magnum opus, but also became the founder of modern zoology, as he gave greater weight to his own observations of nature than to the traditional knowledge of antiquity and the Middle Ages in the four-volume work. However, these still form the basis of the Latin compendium. It is also a reflection of his philological interest: Gessner attached great importance to listing the individual names of the animal species in different languages and mentioning all vernacular variations of their names.

Historia Animalium

Gessner initially published the four extensive volumes on live-bearing quadrupeds (Quadrupedes vivipares), egg-laying quadrupeds (Quadrupedes ovipares), birds (Avium natura) and aquatic creatures (Piscium & aquatilium animantium natura) in Latin. They were published between 1551 and 1558 by Christoph Froschauer in Zurich. In 1587, a further posthumous publication of a fifth volume on snakes was released, which appeared in his estate.

Science and Fantasy

Even the first editions were illustrated with hundreds of woodcuts, which form an important part of the work. While he drew on existing works for most of the illustrations, such as the famous Rhinoceros by Albrecht Dürer or the giraffe from Bernhard von Breydenbach'sPeregrinatio in terram sanctam, he also made some woodcuts himself – 65 in number. Many of the illustrations are purely works of fantasy or were made on the vague basis of verbal descriptions. However, there are also some based on precise observations of nature, which was still an absolute novelty in the 16th century.

The Book of Birds

The entire work quickly became a zoological bestseller, which brought Gessner international fame. Rudolf Hüsli (d. 1600)** translated the third volume of the series into German just two years after its publication. This translation was first published in 1557, also by Christoph Froschauer in Zurich. Here too, the texts, which comprehensively describe all birds and flying animals known at the time in alphabetical order, are supplemented by elaborate woodcuts, some of which are astonishingly naturalistic and come in various sizes.