(2003) 2003 1st US edition. Yale UP / Christopher Helm. New Haven, Connecticut. Paperback. Pp255. B/w photographs & illustrations, bibliography. Fine new copy.
Notes: This is the US edition of The History of Ornithology, first published by Christopher Helm, London 2003. This is a scholarly and informative account of the development of the study of birds, with discussion of natural historians and ornithologists of note, as well as brief biographical notes on each. The process of discovery and the development of taxonomy are a particular concern of the author. Chapters include; early times; the renaissance of ornithology; eighteenth century systems - Linnaeus, Brisson and Buffon, and their legacy; Pallas and the New Awakening; explorations of the eighteenth century; the Germans and the Dutch; the beginnings of American ornithology; the Quinary and other nineteenth century systems; new theories, and explanations from the Far East; the turn of the nineteenth century and the introduction of trinomials; ornithology and ornithologists in the twentieth century, by John Coulson). Appended are 30 different systems of classification.
