E Nieuwe en Onbekende Weereld – Flying Fish

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  SKU: 103035

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• ARTIST: Arnoldus Montanus

• PUBLISHER: Published in Amsterdam by Jacob van Meurs

• MEDIUM: Engraving and letterpress.

  DATE: 1671

• EDITION SIZE: Paper size 12 1/4 x 8" ( 31 x 20.3 cm )

• DESCRIPTION: This leaf from Montanus’ celebrated E Nieuwe en Onbekende Weereld (1671), published in Amsterdam by Jacob van Meurs, describes San Miguel, a fertile valley rich with fruit trees and nourished by the river Ciguatlan, whose waters abound with fish, including the great guarapucu and the gleaming piracoaba. Montanus also provides one of the earliest European accounts of flying fish, or pirabeben: “Dieper zeewaerd vliegende gen de pirabeben, die by duizenden gelijk sich op-lichten boven de golven, om de dolfijns en andere roof-visschen te ontdonkeren: terwijl ondertusschen in de klaeuwen der vogelen vervallen: of ook der visschen, alsoo ’t elckens moeten neder-duiken, om de vleugelen te natten” (“Farther out to sea fly the pirabeben, which by the thousands rise above the waves together to elude dolphins and other predatory fish, though meanwhile they fall into the claws of birds, or back to the fish, since they must continually dive down to wet their wings”). The account emphasizes both the marvel and the vulnerability of these creatures, their membranous fins likened to wings, enabling them to escape one danger only to encounter another, and to Montanus’ 17th-century readers, such passages epitomized the strangeness and wonder of the New World.

• ADDITIONAL INFO: This piece is in a 9 x 14 inch archival mylar for handling.

• CONDITION: Good condition.

• REFERENCE:

• CATEGORIES: 18th-19th Century Subjects , Natural History - Animals & Insects , Fish