The Duchess's Shells: National History Collections and Voyages of Discovery in the Age of Enlightenment Science

公爵夫人的贝壳：启蒙科学时代的国家历史收藏和发现之旅

• 批准号: 0724069
• 负责人: Beth Tobin
• 金额: $ 10.76万
• 依托单位: Arizona State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-08-15 至 2009-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0724069&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Duchess; Shells; National; History; Collections

This project explores shell collecting in late eighteenth-century Britain as a complex social practice and as a form of Enlightenment scientific activity. Shell collecting in the Enlightenment reached its peak in terms of enthusiasm and popularity when Captain James Cook returned to England in the 1770s with shells from the South Pacific. These new, exotic, and rare shells were much desired objects as collectors and naturalists sought to add specimens from the Pacific to their already existing collections of European, Caribbean, and South Asian shells. The methods by which these shells were collected were multiple and complex, involving honorific gift-giving, patron/client hierarchies, commercial exchanges, loans among friends, spectacular auctions, embarrassing swindles, and felony. This project examines the intersection of natural history collecting with the voyages of discovery by focusing on Margaret Cavendish Bentinck, the Duchess of Portland, and her shell collection, which was the largest and finest in England, if not all of Europe. This study reconstructs the culture of shell collecting in this era, focusing on the scientific networks in which the Duchess participated, the methods by which she amassed her collections, and the techniques that she used to classify and display her collection. In the process of tracing the Duchess's activities, this study will also illuminate the collecting practices of England's provincial amateur naturalists as well as London's scientific elite and will reveal the tensions between connoisseurship and professional expertise, the linkage between sociability and science, and the role of gender and class in the production of scientific knowledge. This study is based upon the examination and analysis of archival materials in the form of naturalists' letters, state correspondence, ships' logs, museum guides, and sales catalogs, which are located mostly in Britain, namely, in the British Museum, the British Library, the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow, the Linnean Society, University of Nottingham, the Royal Society, the Royal College of Surgeons, and the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. Intellectual Merit. Too often natural history collecting has been dismissed as an exercise in privilege and connoisseurship. In particular, shell collecting, perhaps because of its emphasis on aesthetic presentation of objects, has been largely overlooked as scientific praxis. This study will suggest that collectors of natural history specimens were ultimately exploring the tension between order and variety in nature as they struggled to classify and catalog their collections according to Linnaean taxonomy. These activities were at the heart of the Enlightenment project of bringing system and order to bear on nature. Most importantly, this project works to restore women as agents in the production of knowledge about nature by documenting in detail the duchess's activities as a collector and classifier of natural history specimens and by examining her relationships with various scientific communities in Britain.Broader Impacts. The results of this research will be disseminated in museum displays on women and natural history, in public presentations as well as at academic conferences, and in university courses on women and science and seminars on collecting and material culture. Results will be published as articles in refereed scholarly journals, and as a book addressed to both general audiences interested in natural history, collecting, and Cook's voyages as well as specialists in history of science, women's studies, history of Pacific exploration, museum studies, and material culture studies.

该项目探讨了十八世纪末英国的贝壳收集作为一种复杂的社会实践和启蒙科学活动的一种形式。当詹姆斯·库克船长于 1770 年代带着来自南太平洋的贝壳返回英国时，启蒙运动时期的贝壳收藏达到了顶峰。这些新的、奇异的、稀有的贝壳是收藏家和博物学家们非常渴望的物品，因为他们试图将来自太平洋的标本添加到他们现有的欧洲、加勒比和南亚贝壳收藏中。收集这些贝壳的方法多种多样且复杂，涉及荣誉礼物、赞助人/客户等级制度、商业交换、朋友之间的贷款、壮观的拍卖、令人尴尬的诈骗和重罪。该项目通过关注波特兰公爵夫人玛格丽特·卡文迪什·本廷克 (Margaret Cavendish Bentinck) 和她的贝壳收藏，探讨自然历史收藏与发现之旅的交叉点，这些贝壳收藏是英格兰乃至全欧洲最大、最精美的。这项研究重建了这个时代的贝壳收藏文化，重点关注公爵夫人参与的科学网络、她收集收藏品的方法以及她用来分类和展示收藏品的技术。在追踪公爵夫人的活动过程中，这项研究还将阐明英格兰地方业余博物学家以及伦敦科学精英的收集实践，并将揭示鉴赏力与专业知识之间的紧张关系、社交性与科学之间的联系，以及性别和阶级在科学知识生产中的作用。本研究基于对博物学家信件、国家信件、船舶日志、博物馆指南和销售目录等形式的档案材料的检查和分析，这些档案材料大部分位于英国，即大英博物馆、大英图书馆、格拉斯哥的亨特博物馆、林奈学会、诺丁汉大学、英国皇家学会、皇家外科医生学院和格林威治的国家海事博物馆。智力优点。自然历史收藏常常被视为一种特权和鉴赏行为。特别是贝壳收藏，也许是因为它强调物体的审美呈现，在很大程度上被忽视为科学实践。这项研究表明，自然历史标本的收藏家在努力根据林奈分类法对收藏品进行分类和编目时，最终探索了自然界的秩序与多样性之间的紧张关系。这些活动是启蒙运动的核心，即给自然带来系统和秩序。最重要的是，该项目致力于通过详细记录公爵夫人作为自然历史标本收藏者和分类者的活动，并检查她与英国各个科学界的关系，恢复女性在自然知识生产中的作用。更广泛的影响。这项研究的结果将在关于妇女和自然历史的博物馆展览、公开演讲和学术会议、关于妇女和科学的大学课程以及关于收藏和物质文化的研讨会中传播。研究结果将作为文章发表在经过审阅的学术期刊上，并作为一本书发表给对自然历史、收藏和库克航海感兴趣的普通读者，以及科学史、妇女研究、太平洋探索史、博物馆研究和物质文化研究方面的专家。