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Natural history

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"High-legged Plover"
Artist: Port Jackson Painter
Created: [between 1788 and 1797]
Dimensions: 20.9 x 15.8 cm
Reference: Watling Drawing - no. 318

 
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Bird in profile, facing to the right. It is depicted standing on a yellow base overlaid with black serpentine lines, surrounded by water represented by a gradated wash from blue-grey through to pink, overlaid with short grey horizontal lines. The underparts of the bird are white with black vertical striations. The back is brown with black markings, and the wing grey with a chestnut patch, black primaries and black markings. The drawing is framed by a pencil border and annotated in ink and pencil.

 
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  • Port Jackson Painter]
  • The drawing is annotated in ink at bottom "This Bird measured thirty Inches".
  • The drawing is unsigned and undated.
  • The drawing is inscribed in ink at top right with the number "246.". This refers to the catalogue list compiled by John Latham c. 1801 which was acquired with the drawings, and is filed with them at the end of the Watling Drawings series.
  • The drawing is annotated in pencil at top "High-legged Plover Syn Sup 2. 319". This has been copied in ink at lower right "High legged Plover Latham Syn Suppt. 2. p. 319". The page reference is to Latham's Second Supplement to the General Synopsis of Birds (1802).
  • This bird was more recently identified as the Bush Curlew, Burhinus magnirostris in Hindwood K. A.9 (1970).
  • The drawing is annotated in pencil at top "Lambert Drawing III 11.". This refers to a related set of drawings from the collections of the 13th Earl of Derby, held in the Library at Knowsley Hall, Lancashire.
  • A separate label is attached to the mount alongside the drawing at lower right. It is inscribed in pencil "Type. GM.".
  • The author of this catalogue record is Suzanne Stenning.
  • By permission of the trustees of the Natural History Museum (London)
  • Two sets of transparencies held in the Natural History Museum (London) Zoology Library and Picture Library: Picture Library reference number 12318
  • James Lee of Kensington : purchased ; 1902
  • Data sheet available.
  • Latham, John. Supplement II to the General Synopsis of Birds. London: Leigh, Sotheby, 1802.
  • Hindwood K. A. 'The "Watling" drawings with incidental notes on the "Lambert" and the "Latham" drawings', Proceedings of the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales for the years 1968-69 (1970).