University of South Carolina receives rare, first edition of Mark Catesby’s ‘Natural History’
March 16, 2009COLUMBIA, SC – March 16, 2009 – Susan Gibbes Robinson, a leading Columbia educator and philanthropist, has given a rare, first edition of Mark Catesby’s 18th-century The Natural History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands to the University of South Carolina Libraries.
The two massive, leather-bound volumes, published in London in 1731 and 1743, contain the works of the British naturalist during his four-year odyssey through the wilds of South Carolina. The volumes boast 220 hand-colored, copper-plate engraved illustrations of flora and fauna on the right-hand pages, with descriptions in English and French in parallel columns on the facing pages.
Catesby preceded Audubon by about 100 years. And there are only, roughly, in the world 70 copies, said Tom McNally, dean of libraries. Many have been destroyed, as people have broken up the volumes and sold the pages individually. This puts University of South Carolina Libraries in rare company with institutions such as the Smithsonian and other elite libraries and museums.
The Gibbes-Robinson Catesby is the only first edition Natural History in a South Carolina library. At the university, it joins later Catesby editions, as well as some of the nation’s finest holdings in natural history, including the complete original double-elephant folio set of John James Audubon’s Birds of America and a first edition American Ornithology by Alexander Wilson.
The volumes are on display in the Graniteville Room of Thomas Cooper Library through March 27 and will be exhibited again later this summer.
Catesby is remarkable for myriad reasons.
Only informal natural history accounts existed before Catesby, said Dr. Patrick Scott, director of special collections at Thomas Cooper Library. Catesby provided the first full-scale natural-history study for any area of the United States. It was the most impressive, most substantial study of its kind – particularly for the birds of the United States – for nearly 100 years.
The Natural History volumes provide one of the earliest accounts of natural life in the Carolinas. They also provide a record of species now extinct, including the ivory-billed woodpecker and the Carolina Parakeet, the last known survivor having died in 1912 in a Cincinnati zoo. The illustrations range from birds in the first volume to mammals, fish, plants and reptiles in the second volume.
Catesby’s approach was landmark in the illustration of natural history, as he was the first naturalist to depict birds in their natural habitat. Today, Catesby’s revolutionary approach to illustration is more commonly associated with Audubon, although many scholars are quick to credit Catesby for his high level of detail and quality.
Earlier illustrations were often woodcuts, which were stilted, Scott said. They were always done from dead specimens, posed and not very realistic. Catesby differs in the level of detail, the quality of the coloring – he mixed his own colors – and the size.
McNally said Robinson’s gift completes the university’s Catesby holdings.
The Gibbes-Robinson Catesby complements and enhances the university’s Catesby holdings, he said. Scholars will be able to see the progression of the first, second and third editions. Each edition is unique because of the way in which the Catesbys were assembled.
Robinson said her father, the late Dr. J. Heyward Gibbes, bought the two-volume set in the early 1920s from Gittman’s Bookshop on Main Street in Columbia. As a young girl, she loved looking at the books, getting lost in their beauty and in her thoughts of what Catesby’s travels would have been like. Illustrations of the red belly’d woodpecker, the American partridge and the attamusco lily were among her favorites. She didn’t realize the treasure her family possessed until she was 15 years old.
I was in the Governor’s Palace in Williamsburg, and there was an open book on display. It was familiar; it was Catesby, Robinson said at a recent university library reception held in her honor. I asked the guide to turn to the front page so that I could look at the numbers. When I returned home, I looked at our books’ numbers. Williamsburg’s book was a second edition; ours was a first edition. I knew then it was very rare.
After a lifetime of studying Catesby, Robinson, at age 93, says she finds comfort in knowing that her beloved Catesby will join the naturalist’s later editions and other rare natural history books in the university’s special collections.
Catesby was a real friend of mine. I’ve enjoyed him thoroughly, Robinson said. I hate to part with them, but I’m happy to have them at Thomas Cooper Library. The university is a central part of our town and community.
At her request, the university will place the volumes on public display at least once a year, with a daily turning of the pages. Once each day when the book is on exhibit, a university librarian will turn the pages of the two volumes so that visitors can enjoy the artistry of the different illustrations contained in Catesby’s magnum opus.
Some of our natural-history treasures were bought new by the university during its earliest days, said Scott. We opened a bit late – 1801 – to a buy a first edition Catesby. The Gibbes-Robinson volumes fill that gap, and we will use this gift and let people get to know it.
The Association of Research Libraries recently compiled a volume of the distinctive special collections of each member institution; for the University of South Carolina libraries, the editors chose to feature the natural-history collections.
The Gibbes-Robinson Catesby
Susan Gibbes Robinson
Susan Gibbes Robinson is well known for her philanthropy and community leadership in education and the arts. The 93-year-old Columbia native is the daughter of the late Dr. J. Heyward Gibbes, a prominent physician, and Eugenia Salley. A teacher who graduated from Converse College and the University of South Carolina, Robinson founded Heathwood Hall Episcopal School in 1951 and was the first head of school.
Her love for science, education and art led Robinson to endow a professorship at the University of South Carolina’s School of Medicine in honor of her father and to establish the David Robinson Fund at the university’s School of Law in honor of her late husband. She has served on the boards of the South Caroliniana Society, the University of South Carolina School of Medicine Partnership Board, the Columbia Museum of Art, the Baruch Foundation and Still Hopes Episcopal Retirement Community.
On March 11, Robinson was honored by the University of South Carolina Libraries for her generous gift of a rare, first-edition, two-volume set of Mark Catesby’s The Natural History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands (1731 and 1743).
The Gibbes-Robinson Catesby
Sidebar
University libraries to host Columbia screening of ‘The Curious Mister Catesby’ March 24
University of South Carolina historian Dr. Walter Edgar will discuss the importance of naturalist Mark Catesby to South Carolina’s early history Tuesday, March 24, at a free public screening of the film, The Curious Mister Catesby.
The event will take place at 7 p.m. in the university’s School of Law auditorium. On display will be the Gibbes-Robinson Catesby, a rare first edition of Natural History of Carolina, Florida and The Bahama Islands that has been given to the university libraries’ rare books and special collections by Susan Gibbes Robinson.
Joining Edgar will be the film’s producer, David Elliott, who will offer brief r
emarks before the 53-minute film is shown.
A reception co-sponsored by the Thomas Cooper Society and Institute for Southern Studies will take place afterward in the lobby.
The film, The Curious Mister Catesby, details the life and work of 18th-century British scientist and artist Mark Catesby (1683-1749) and his seminal work. Funded by the Catesby Commemorative Trust, the film will begin airing on SC-ETV beginning April 5.
Edgar is the George Washington Distinguished Professor of History and Claude Henry Neuffer Professor of Southern Studies at the University of South Carolina.
For more information, contact the university’s Thomas Cooper Library at 803-576-6016 or [email protected].
The Gibbes-Robinson Catesby
What they’re saying…
It is absolutely incredible to have this first edition Catesby stay here. People don’t understand what a document like this can mean to students of history. Yes, you can look at Catesby — some slides online, for example — but it’s not the same thing as being able to look at the original. All too often the treasures of our state are bought up by folks from elsewhere and carried off literally to museums around the country and around the world. This is a treasure that is thankfully staying home where we can learn the wonder and the variety of our state’s natural heritage.
There was tremendous interest in Europe, particularly in England, about the New World, as they called it. There are records from the very early settlements in South Carolina in the 1670s of individuals sending back specimens of plants, flowers and Indian artifacts.
Mark Catesby is just a fabulous character. He came to South Carolina in 1722 and spent three years here traveling from the Lowcountry to the mountains and uncovering many rare plants that had never been seen before. Catesby said he found everything here that he found in Virginia but much more and a much greater variety than what was in the old Commonwealth. He went on bison and panther hunts with the Cherokee Indians and uncovered the first fossils that were ever discovered in North America, probably in the Savannah River Valley somewhere near present day Beech Island.
~ Dr. Walter Edgar, the George Washington Distinguished Professor of History and Claude Henry Neuffer Professor of Southern Studies at the University of South Carolina
What a wonderful addition an original Catesby. So terrific to have it included at the University of South Carolina, a very appropriate home. Mark Catesby, a British artist, traveled to America to see for himself the birds of the New World in their natural setting.
~ Jacalyn C. Spoon, librarian Cornell University’s Lab of Ornithology
Mark Catesby’s ‘Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands’ is one of the seminal early works in the field of American natural history. Based on direct observation and the collecting of actual specimens, Catesby was a precursor of the great naturalists of the future, including Audubon, in that Catesby produced his own drawings and even etched his own plates. Also in advance of his time, Catesby emphasized naturalistic accuracy rather than the more typical artistically interpretative approach. No great library of American natural history can be complete without the first edition of Catesby’s ‘Natural History.’ This is particularly true for the already excellent collection at the University of South Carolina since Catesby spent time in Charleston, and many of his images derive from his travels in the Lowcountry as far as the Savannah River and as far west as the Blue Ridge. The acquisition of the ‘Natural History’ is very important in that it will round out South Carolina’s already superb holdings.
~ Dr. Samuel A. Streit, associate university librarian, Brown University
A first edition Catesby is exciting…spectacular. Mark Catesby introduced Europeans to America’s natural history, and they got excited about what he depicted. I personally love the snake prints; they’re just not as popular as birds.
~ Rudy Mancke, naturalist, guest curator at the University of South Carolina McKissick Museum, and host for 25 years of the popular PBS series, Nature Scene.
The first comprehensive and arguably the most accomplished illustrated survey of the flora and fauna of the British-American colonies. Mark Catesby’s ‘Natural History’ was first published in parts between 1731 and 1743 with the support of the Hans Sloane and the Royal Society of London. Part of its impact derives from the fact that Catesby engraved the plates from his own paintings and oversaw the hand coloring of the printed copies. Consisting of more than 200 hand-colored engravings and a map of the area Catesby explored, this magnificent work took over 20 years to produce and earned Catesby the title of ‘Founder of American Ornithology.’ It is a wonderful high spot of Americana and supports research in many areas, including natural history, ornithology, color plate printing, scientific illustration and exploration and discovery, among other topics.
~ Dr. Steven Smith, associate dean for collections and services, Texas A&M University Libraries