Natural Collection

Humans have long collected, categorised and depicted the natural world, from the 15th century cabinets of curiosities filled with natural wonders, to botanical drawings of flora and fauna. The primary aim of many historic nature collections was to foster a deeper understanding of the natural world through the categorisation of specimens and their data. In the age of discovery, they served as valuable research resources; to catalogue, identify and classify new species, study them for research, and preserve them. We are all familiar with the images of butterflies, moths and assorted insects caught and pinned to boards. We may not think of doing this now, but often specimens such as these were key in telling the history of the human desire to understand the natural world. These acts of collection reflect both a reverence for nature and a desire to interpret it.