First scientific illustration of a complete ichthyosaur skeleton. Copper fold-out engraving at life size, ( ammonite top right for scale). It com

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First scientific illustration of a complete ichthyosaur skeleton. Copper fold-out engraving at life size, ( ammonite top right for scale). It comes from a paper by Sir Everard Home in 1819. He was the first geologist to publish detailed reports and illustrations on the ichthyosaurs (previous more fragmentary remains had been misidentified as crocodiles) but he did a poor job, naming them Proteosaurus for a semblance to salamanders in 1819 - a name that was hence widely ignored. Preference was given to Konig's unpublished suggestion of the name Icthyosaur, and De La Beche and Conybeare soon came to write the definitive early papers on ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs. The specimen was in Bullock's museum in Piccadilly and is referred to by Home in a letter to Scoursby. See other images in this collection ref Everard Home letter.

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Size: 7039px × 2483px
Photo credit: © PAUL D STEWART/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No

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