61 (Manihot)

Title

61 (Manihot)

Description

Plate 61, Representation of moths and caterpillars.

ca. 1705

Artist

Merian (1647-1717)

Maria Sibylla Merian was a German-born naturalist and scientific illustrator, a descendant of the Frankfurt branch of the Swiss Merian family. Merian was one of the first European naturalists to observe insects directly. Merian received her artistic training from her stepfather, Jacob Marrel, a student of the still life painter Georg Flegel. Merian published her first book of natural illustrations in 1675. She had started to collect insects as an adolescent and at age thirteen she raised silk worms. In 1679 Merian published the first volume of a two-volume series on caterpillars, the second volume followed in 1683. Each volume contained 50 plates engraved and etched by Merian. Merian documented evidence on the process of metamorphosis and the plant hosts of 186 European insect species. Along with the illustrations Merian included a descriptions of their life cycles. In 1699 Merian travelled to Dutch Surinam to study and record the tropical insects. In 1705 she published Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium. Few colour images of the New World were printed before 1700 and thus Merian's Metamorphosis has been credited with influencing a range of naturalist illustrators. Because of her careful observations and documentation of the metamorphosis of the butterfly, she is considered by David Attenborough to be among the most significant contributors to the field of entomology. She was a leading entomologist of her time and she discovered many new facts about insect life through her studies. Regarding her youth, in the foreword to Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium, Merian wrote: "I spent my time investigating insects. At the beginning, I started with silk worms in my home town of Frankfurt. I realized that other caterpillars produced beautiful butterflies or moths, and that silkworms did the same. This led me to collect all the caterpillars I could find in order to see how they changed".

Historical Description

With more than 160,000 described species, butterflies are the second most diverse order of insects after beetles (Coleoptera). In superstition, butterflies were even regarded as the embodiment of witches who were after the cream, which is also indicated by the earlier regional names for butterflies such as milk thief, whey stealer or similar. The English term butterfly points in the same direction and corresponds to the regional terms butterbird, butterbird, butterlicker, as the animals were attracted by churning butter. The word butterfly only became generally accepted in the second half of the 18th century. Until then, this order of insects was still called "day birds" (for butterflies) or "night birds" (for moths) according to Rösel von Rosenhof (1749). Butterflies go through a cycle of unusual shape changes during their lifetime. Eggs develop into flightless "caterpillars", which grow considerably while feeding intensively. At the end of the caterpillar stage, they transform into a more solid shell, the so-called "pupa". In the pupa, they form wings and transform into the flying form, the so-called "moth".