Maria Sibylla Merian

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Maria Sibylla Merian

1647-1717

Heron Encircled by a Snake, with a Worm in his Bill

Waterccolor and white opaque watercolor, with selectively applied gum arabic, on vellum.

14 7/8 x 12 1/16 inches (377 x 307 mm)

Purchased as the gift of Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr. in memory of Landon K. Thorne, Jr.

1980.43

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Inscription:

Inscribed at lower right, in pale brown ink, "Dieses Vogel heist auf Indianisch / Coximoyanex er isset Würme, Schlangen s.s. / Die Schlange die um ihn gewunden ist, wird / Rattenfanger genant". A nearly identical inscription appears on the verso, at lower right, in brown ink, "Dieses Vogel heist auf / Indianisch Coximoyanex / er ist Würme, / Schlange, / die Schlange die um ihn ge: / wunden ist, wird Ratten fanger genant / daru. das sie Ratten verschluckt".

Provenance:

Acquired at sale, Amsterdam, Sotheby Mak van Waay, 18 November 1980, lot 67, repr.

Bibliography:

Ryskamp, Charles, ed. Nineteenth Report to the Fellows of the Pierpont Morgan Library, 1978-1980. New York : Pierpont Morgan Library, 1981, p. 204.
Jane Shoaf Turner, with contributions by Felice Stampfle, Dutch Drawings in the Pierpont Morgan Library: Seventeenth to Nineteenth Centuries, New York, 2006, cat. no. 153.

Notes:

The inscription on the recto and verso explains that the "worm-eating bird is named Coximoyanex by the Indians" and that the "snake encircling him is called a rat-catcher."

Associated names:

Thorne, Landon K., Jr., Mrs., donor.

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Merian, Maria Sibylla

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