. Bonn zoological bulletin. Zoology. The Historic Linck Collection of Snakes 223. Fig. 3. Exterior of the Museum Waldcnburg Naturalienkabi- nett und Heimatmuseum in 2005. Photo: A. M. Bauer. early IS"" century alcohol preparations consisting chiefly of amphibians and reptiles as well as embiyonic materi- al (Altner 1984; Fig. 2). However, perhaps the most im- portant intact herpetological collection from the dawn of fluid preservation is that established by the pharmacist Heinrich Linck (1638-1717; Plate la) in Leipzig, Ger- many. Linck was one of many European apothecaries who assem
. Bonn zoological bulletin. Zoology. The Historic Linck Collection of Snakes 223. Fig. 3. Exterior of the Museum Waldcnburg Naturalienkabi- nett und Heimatmuseum in 2005. Photo: A. M. Bauer. early IS"" century alcohol preparations consisting chiefly of amphibians and reptiles as well as embiyonic materi- al (Altner 1984; Fig. 2). However, perhaps the most im- portant intact herpetological collection from the dawn of fluid preservation is that established by the pharmacist Heinrich Linck (1638-1717; Plate la) in Leipzig, Ger- many. Linck was one of many European apothecaries who assembled such collections during the 17"' century (Dilg 1994), but his collection, augmented by his son and grand- son, is one of few that has survived - in part - the vagaries of more than 300 years of turbulent European history. To- day the collection forms part of the Museum Waldenburg (Fig. 3) in the small Saxon town of Waldenburg, 67 km south of Leipzig, Germany and is regarded as one of the very oldest surviving museum collections of this kind (Mohr 1940; Fleck et al. 1990; Zinke 1999). No records exist documenting the oldest parts of the col- lection and thus the unambiguous identification of any por- tions of the collection dating from Heinrich Linck's time is not possible. Nonetheless, the collection includes a num- ber of distinctive specimens of various kinds that date from the first decades following Heinrich Linck's death. For ex- ample, the famous "chicken man" (Hiihnemicnsch), a mal- formed human foetus, was described and figured in 1737 by Gottlieb Friderici and is still extant today (Miiller 1999). Other specimens from these early days that are still present in the collection include a number of distinctive fossils (RoBler 1999a, 1999b), among them examples of "lying stones," crude fossil forgeries described by Beringer (1726), raw and worked mineral samples (Thal- heim 1999), a collection of wood samples (Beyrich 1990; Otto & Otto 1999
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