How a great auk “flew” from Durham to Glasgow

Fifty years ago, I travelled to Durham University to be interviewed for a PhD studentship to work with Dr Lewis Davies on the blackly larvae (Simuliidae) living in streams in Upper Teesdale. I had always liked moorland and the project involved regular sampling of streams on the Pennines, to collect larvae and then analyse the life histories and production of the populations. Among the questions I was asked at the interview were whether I was prepared to work on my own on the fells and whether I had a driver’s licence, as the studentship came with a short wheelbase Land Rover that would allow access to some of the rougher tracks that I would need to use. I was positive about the first, but I hadn’t passed my driving test and would need to do so. Despite this answer, I was offered the post and accepted readily.

I then needed to take an intensive course of driving lessons that resulted in a pass in what was a very high-pressure test. It was such a relief as I was very keen to go to Durham and I had been impressed by the wonderful city and, especially, the people whom I had met in the Department of Zoology. It wasn’t only the people that impressed – so did the stuffed great auk that had a prominent position at the foot of the staircase in the Zoology Building. I knew that these birds had become extinct but had never before seen a museum specimen and I found it fascinating.

When I moved to Durham, the great auk became a “friend” as I had to pass it as I made my way upstairs to the common room, where we took coffee. Recently, I was intrigued to read about its history, and current location, in a paper by R.A.Baker  in the Archives of Natural History [1]. It is worth quoting from his paper:

The ”Durham” Great Auk had a long association with the University of Durham, from about 1834 to 1977 – a span of over 140 years.. ..Canon Thomas Gisborne (1758-1846), a Prebend at Durham and early benefactor, bought and presented the Great Auk to the new university.. .. When science was re-established at Durham in 1924, the Great Auk was transferred to the newly-built Dawson building and insured against fire and theft. J.J.O.Mason, the Head of Science at the time, recalled “When I came, I begged it for the new department (Science), remarking that some day we should have a Zoology department, which would be glad of it.”.. ..By the late 1970s the Head of the Department of Zoology at Durham, Professor David Barker, decided to sell the specimen.. ..Some disquiet was expressed after the sale was agreed. The sale went ahead on the agreement that the money raised would be placed in a fund “to make purchases to maintain the quality of the zoological specimens teaching collection”.. .. The auction of the “Durham” Great Auk took place at Sotheby’s in London on Wednesday 21 September 1977 and was sold to a Michael Pilkington for £4200.. .Mr Pilkington eventually decided to sell the Auk, and gave the museum [the Kelvingrove Museum in Glasgow, where it had been on loan] the first option on it. The Glasgow Great Auk Appeal, launched the day before the 150th anniversary of its extinction, helped to raise sufficient funds for the museum to purchase the specimen for £30,000 in 1994.

It continues to be exhibited at the Kelvingrove Museum (see below), although I have not been to visit my old “friend”

What is the attraction of extinct animals? We are all familiar with the enthusiasm that many have for dinosaurs and the ammonite fossils of the Jurassic Coast, and these animals became extinct millions of years ago, overtaken by evolution and climate change. Those factors may also explain the much more recent demise of mammoths (like dinosaurs, strong favourites with the public), but very recent extinctions, like that of the great auk and some other flightless birds, were the result of human exploitation. We know that Ole Worm (1588-1654) had a live specimen from the Faroe Islands that he fed on herrings and he also had at least one stuffed great auk in his private museum [2]. With the rise of interest by collectors in rarities, and with little defence against humans, great auks didn’t stand a chance, having already been taken as food and for their feathers [3,4]. Perhaps our fascination with them results from a sense of loss and a recognition that we have been responsible for their being wiped out - and knowing that we will never see one alive? 

It is all a long way from collecting blackfly larvae in Upper Teesdale, but the Durham great auk certainly had, and continues to have, a strong appeal for me. I think it is a pity that it was sold (at what appears a knockdown price), but good to know it “lives on” in Glasgow.

[1] R.A.Baker (1999) Going, going, gone – the “Durham” Great Auk. Archives of Natural History 26:113-119.

[2] A.V.DeLozoya, D.G.García and J.Parish (2016) A great auk for the Sun King. Archives of Natural History 43:41-56.

[3] W.R.P.Bourne (1993) The story of the Great Auk Pinguinis impennis. Archives of Natural History 20: 257-278.

[4] T.R.Birkhead (1994) How collectors killed… New Scientist Issue 1227 May 28th 1994.

COVID 19 – and more bad press for bats

In an earlier blog post [1], I asked the question “What’s not to like about bats?”. Accepting that bats are not universally popular, I pointed out that, for many, they are associated with unpleasantness and feature in several stories about witches. This is illustrated in the frightening image of Goya’s Witches’ Sabbath, where bats fly over the witches’ heads as they worship the devil in the form of a goat (see below, with detail).

Further in the blog post [1], I wrote:

This association with the “dark world” stems from the crepuscular and nocturnal habits of bats, and our nervousness about what happens during darkness – a “fear of the night” and anxiety about the possible presence of evil spirits. There is also something about the rapid flight of bats that some find disturbing and one belief is that they can become entangled in hair. ..A further prominent feature of folklore is that bat blood, or other extracts from the animals, cure eye diseases; arising, no doubt, from the ability of bats to be active in darkness.

We can now add another negative to the reputation of these fascinating mammals with the discovery that bats may be the source of the COVID19 global pandemic. In a paper published in The Lancet [2], Lu et al. write:

..on the basis of current data, it seems likely that the 2019-nCoV causing the Wuhan outbreak might also be initially hosted by bats, and might have been transmitted to humans via currently unknown wild animal(s) sold at the Huanan seafood markets.

One suggested intermediary is the pangolin, but other animals present in the market are more likely. But then, what if some of the Huanan stallholders knew of the folklore that bat blood aids the cure of eye diseases and rubbed infected bat blood into their eyes? This practice was known from Ancient Egypt, but mythologies travel. We will probably never know if this happened, but I hope that one of the solutions to our problems with this coronavirus is not the attempted extermination of bats, when the pandemic almost certainly results from the activities of humans.

[1] http://www.rwotton.blogspot.com/2014/04/whats-not-to-like-about-bats.html

[2] Roujian Lu + 34 co-authors (2020) Genomic characterisation and epidemiology of 2019 novel coronavirus: implications for virus origins and receptor binding. The Lancet 395:565-574.

The zoology of Bruegel’s The Fall of the Rebel Angels

Pieter Bruegel the Elder is best known for scenes of everyday life and he can be regarded as the first well-known exponent of genre painting. The Fall of the Rebel Angels shows a quite different topic: the expulsion of Lucifer from Heaven by St Michael and a group of angels loyal to God. Bruegel shows us St Michael (with his shield bearing the cross of the resurrection), but it is difficult to make out Lucifer in his many-headed form. Heavenly light shines from the top of the picture, through the blue sky, and we then move down to the darkness of the abyss of Hell. Some animals are present in the sky, together with angels, and most are descending into Hell, which is not fiery, as it is described in The Holy Bible and as it is usually shown in paintings. The only hint of fire in Bruegel’s work turns out to be a feathery headdress.

An excellent commentary on the painting has been provided by the Royal Museums of Fine Art in Brussels, where the painting is exhibited [1]. As mentioned in this commentary, several of the animals shown are based on those from collections of curiosities, which were becoming popular as sources of wonder at the unfamiliar.

I would like to make some additional comments on some of the animals shown in the painting.

The puffer fish

Bruegel shows a puffer fish with the body distended. One defence mechanism used by these fish is to rapidly take water into the stomach to “inflate” the body and make spines stand out: the same mechanism is used when the fish gulp air should they be caught out of the water. In this state, puffer fish have been preserved by drying and it is likely that Bruegel saw a preserved specimen displayed in a collection of curiosities. While the eyes look unnatural, he shows the fused teeth that are used by the living fish to bite into their prey [2].

Interestingly, some puffer fish have another defence mechanism in the production of chemicals within the liver that are highly toxic to humans. So much so, that raw fugu – a delicacy in some parts of the world – requires preparation by specially-trained chefs. It tempts us to think that the inflation of the body, and the production of toxins, evolved to prevent predation by humans, but both must have existed long before the evolution of humans.

Two dead fish and bloated frogs

The fish are shown with their mouths open as if gasping, an indication of distress that Bruegel clearly wished to convey. The same intention of providing images that cause us to become frightened comes in the bloated frog, whether bloating was caused by decomposition or, should the frog be female, by being filled with eggs that will now not be laid. A second frog-like creature is shown with the abdomen split open to show what appears to be spawn, but this animal is different to Bruegel’s frog (having what looks like the “parson’s nose” of a chicken at the end of the abdomen). I have no idea what Bruegel was trying to show here.

Mussels + a crustacean

In this image we see two open mussel shells containing the body of each mollusc. The two mussels, each shown inside one of their shell valves, have clearly been cooked as, in life, the mantle (the pink/yellow fold) is closely applied to the shell for almost all of its length. Lying between the two mussels is what appears to be a crustacean, blue in colour like a lobster when alive, and the whole reminds us of a flying creature, with the mussel shells forming “wings”.

The stenogastrine wasp

Although stylised, the stenogastrine wasp is probably included as a threat and also as a bizarre creature that would also have occurred in a collection of curiosities. These wasps, like other social insects, are likely to be female and possessed of a mild sting. However, they are not usually aggressive and their appearance more frightening than reality, especially when shown at such a large size relative to other recognisable animals in the painting.

The falling birds

Two birds are shown falling into the abyss. One appears to be laying an egg, but it is impossible to identify what type of bird it might be: the other resembles a great auk, now extinct. Interestingly, Ole Worm (1588-1654), the Danish natural historian and physician, kept a great auk as a pet and, after its death and preservation, it might have found its way into his splendid cabinet of curiosities [3].

We can spend much time in speculating on what Bruegel intended in his use of images of animals, both real and imaginary. His view of the expulsion of Lucifer is certainly unique and is based on his imagination, with no attempt made to show the realistic scale of the different components. Dead terrestrial and aquatic animals are present in all parts of the painting, together with images that are supernatural and were likely to have been strongly influenced by the earlier works of Hieronymus Bosch (as mentioned in the commentary).

It is an extraordinary painting.

[1] https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/the-fall-of-the-rebel-angels-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium/lQLy-oPTgMeLKg?hl=en

[2] https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2017/may/pufferfish-beak-originates-from-stem-cell-tweak.html

[3] https://www.stgeorges-windsor.org/image_of_the_month/worms-cabinet-curiosities/