News Release

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June 17, 2005

Boise State Professor Discovers Rare Drawing
 

Boise State University professor Janice Neri made a rare discovery while poring over centuries-old books, and with a little help from a colleague at Boise State she recently published her finding for the first time.

Neri, an assistant art history professor, was doing research on one of her specialties, scientific drawings from the 16^th and 17^th centuries, in the British Library in London. She was looking through a notebook owned by John Covel, a 17^th century naturalist and illustrator, when she noticed an illustration of a bug that looked very familiar.

The drawing was similar to one she had studied in Robert Hooke’s Micrographia, a groundbreaking text that was published in London in 1665. Micrographia was used for centuries as one of the definitive scientific textbooks. It was the result of Hooke’s experiments with a new instrument, the microscope, and introduced readers to things such as cells and the tiny weave of a piece of taffeta. It also included an engraved drawing of a pseudoscorpion, an insect that Hooke examined after finding it in a book he was reading.

Neri recognized the drawing of the pseudoscorpion in Covel’s notebook as the one from Micrographia. It is only the second known surviving sketch for Micrographia. No one is quite sure what happened to the rest, but Neri said that a common theory is that they were consumed by London’s great fire in 1666, which destroyed most of the city.

Hooke’s notebook drawing is initialed, and appears along with the works of Covel and several other illustrators. The sketch is slightly different from the final engraving — the bug has six legs in the sketch, for example, and eight in the engraving — but is recognizable as the pseudoscorpion.

Neri realized that she had a great find, but she needed the help of assistant biology professor Ian Robertson to get her information published. After presenting her finding at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C., in 2002, she set about writing an article about the sketch. In order to publish her finding in the Archives of Natural History, she had to scientifically identify the drawings in the notebook. Robertson, who teaches entomology, helped her identify the insects.

Neri’s finding was published in a spring edition of the Archives. Neri is returning to London this summer to do more research.

Contact: Janice Neri, Art Department, (208) 426-1607, janiceneri@boisestate.edu 

Media Contact: Julie Hahn, University Relations, (208) 426-5540, juliehahn@boisestate.edu

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Last reviewed on Thursday, December 22, 2005