Credit: © The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.9939
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    ‘Bird-eating spider with humming bird’

    Date
    1705
    Creator
    Joseph Mulder (1659 - 1718, Dutch) , Printmaker
    After
    Maria Sibylla Merian (1647 - 1717, German) , Painter
    Object type
    Library reference
    55255
    Material
    Technique
    Dimensions
    height (print): 510mm
    width (print): 350mm
    Subject
    Content object
    nature
       > animal
          > insect
    nature
       > animal
          > bird
    Description
    Study of a bird-eating South American spider (a tarantula or possibly the Goliath birdeater Theraphosa blondi) with humming bird prey.

    Detail from plate 18 of the book Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium, in qua Erucae ac Vermes Surinamenses, cum omnibus suis transformationibus by Maria Sibylla Merian (Amsterdam, 1705). Showing the inscription lower left “P Sluiter Sculp.”

    The entomologist and artist Maria Sibylla Merian travelled to Surinam in South America from 1699-1701, where she recorded and collected butterflies and other natural history specimens.
    Associated place
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