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My birthday present this year, about the study of nature in The Netherlands, from 1500 to 1900, in 20 cases and the things around them...

Cover: 1 and 2.
Part of a plate and the complete plate: 3 and 4.
The head of an Apis: 5.

4 is af course a known plate...

A few days later I got this book about the history of Flanders, much discussed in the press about the 60 events and how they were chosen...
But it gives anly a little bit about the facts with a big picture and the 5 next pages per item give more little things not mentioned in the title...

A very good book about 1302, our great combat...

Cover 1 and 2
Pictures from it 3 and 4

Part of a good, very good old book, but as a comic:

To get back to that comic...

The original book was choosen as the best book ever, in Dutch, around 2000,...

Multatuli, Max Havelaar (1860) (135)
[anoniem, Willem] Van den vos Reynaerde (13de eeuw) (134)
Gerard Reve, De avonden (1947) (72)
Joost van den Vondel, Gysbreght van Aemstel (1637) (59)
W.F. Hermans, De donkere kamer van Damocles (1958) (57)

The first book is from The Netherlands, the second from Belgium.
Between the last () on every line is the votes they got, only one is the difference....

The author is Eduard Douwes Dekker, Dutch writer (1820–1887).
The complete title of the book: Max Havelaar, of De koffij-veilingen der Nederlandsche Handel-Maatschappij.

The book is about the situation in the Dutch Oversee Islands in the period 1850-1860 and still has an important influence on the Dutch literature. It was so bad for the Royal industrie at that moment that the names in it were only put in the 5te edition in it, therefore it were cover-names.

A very good edition is: https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/mult001maxh17_01/

I did forget to mention this:

Eduard Douwes Dekker was the real name of the author and he did experience most of the things written in the book.
Multatuli was his author name and he had to hide a lot before he could write it down. Years later the book was published and it lasted more years until the real names were published.
Multatuli wrote his book in Brussel, the place of other important writers.... but he was from The Netherlands...

And a very good cd about the most productive years of a Belgian singer....

Teleutotje hat geschrieben:My birthday present this year, about the study of nature in The Netherlands, from 1500 to 1900, in 20 cases and the things around them...

It is indeed a very interesting book, sadly not in English or German. And it covers more than just Dutch people, also Englishman, French, Germans, Italian,.....

A few examples from in the book:

1) Birds of Paradice, yes, but how did they come to there name? Simple. The birds were shipped from far away to England. There they described them but... What a wonder, birds without wings or legs. They realy are from paradice. Even Linnaeus described one without wings...
Sadly, it was only practical. They catched the birds in those days, cut off there wings and legs, conserved them and on to Europe. But why did they cut off the wings and legs? Simple; they were hard to conserve so... cut them off and they, the birds, stay clean. Sadly: they didn't tell that to the Europeans, with all the problems attadched to it. Only years later the birds were coming to be known with wings and legs...

2) The pelican. Linneaus didn't give that bird a name. Why? Because of the red spot on his neck. When the bird sits it keeps the point of his beak +/- on that place. So than Linneaus thought that the young would be fed with blood of the parent. Impossible. Not describe such a murderous bird.
Later on, Linneaus got the story wright and described the bird...

3) Van Leeuwenhoek. A Dutch scientist, not educated as scientist. He became member of the Londen society and started to publish his discoveries. He wrote 121 Dutch letters to Londen, they translated the letters and published them. The 122 letter was written by Van Leeuwenhoek in Latin. Why? It was only meant for the English scientists and those communicate in Latin. And the story was about a thing Van Leeuwenhoek published only for scientists. What was it? Van Leeuwenhoek describes how he got a sertain material and the description of it under the microscope. And the material was: Sperm...
Van Leeuwenhoek was also the first scientist who saw bacteria under the microscope. Almost two centuries later Pasteur and co did learn what those bacteria can do...

4) Dragons and co. Linnaeus did not describe them because he demonstrated already a few years before that they were not real. And when he sayd that, the church got angry to him and banned him for a few years. Why? They owned an examplar of dragon but...

And then, a little story about a beetle Linneaus did not give a name. But it turned out to be real and so he later gave it the name it deserved. Its name? The Deadth beetle...

Linnaeus list:

A book bought 3 day ago, on February, 10, about Syrphidae...

A little book from march 04, 2024. It is important as a supplement to one of the most famous diaries from the second world war.... "Het achterhuis" from Anne Frank.

I had it as copies but now as a book: