Animalia Paradoxa

Last updated
Table of the Animal Kingdom ("Regnum Animale") from the 1st edition of Systema Naturae (1735) Linnaeus - Regnum Animale (1735).png
Table of the Animal Kingdom ("Regnum Animale") from the 1st edition of Systema Naturæ (1735)

Animalia Paradoxa [1] (Latin for "contradictory animals"; cf. paradox) are the mythical, magical or otherwise suspect animals mentioned in the first five editions of Carl Linnaeus's seminal work Systema Naturae under the header "Paradoxa". It lists fantastic creatures found in medieval bestiaries and some animals reported by explorers from abroad and explains why they are excluded from Systema Naturae. According to Swedish historian Gunnar Broberg, it was to offer a natural explanation and demystify the world of superstition. [2] Paradoxa was dropped from Linnaeus' classification system as of the 6th edition (1748). [3]

Contents

Paradoxa

These 10 taxa appear in the 1st to 5th editions:

The above 10 taxa and the 4 taxa following were in the 2nd (1740) edition and the 4th and 5th editions (total 14 entries): [9]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carl Linnaeus</span> Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist (1707–1778)

Carl Linnaeus, also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné, was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming organisms. He is known as the "father of modern taxonomy". Many of his writings were in Latin; his name is rendered in Latin as Carolus Linnæus and, after his 1761 ennoblement, as Carolus a Linné.

Vermes ("worms") is an obsolete taxon used by Carl Linnaeus and Jean-Baptiste Lamarck for non-arthropod invertebrate animals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tropicbird</span> Family of birds

Tropicbirds are a family, Phaethontidae, of tropical pelagic seabirds. They are the sole living representatives of the order Phaethontiformes. For many years they were considered part of the Pelecaniformes, but genetics indicates they are most closely related to the Eurypygiformes. There are three species in one genus, Phaethon. The scientific names are derived from Ancient Greek phaethon, "sun". They have predominantly white plumage with elongated tail feathers and small feeble legs and feet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greater yellowlegs</span> Species of bird

The greater yellowlegs is a large shorebird in the family Scolopacidae. It breeds in central Canada and southern Alaska and winters in southern North America, Central America, the West Indies and South America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Artedi</span> Swedish zoologist (1705–1735)

Peter Artedi or Petrus Arctaedius was a Swedish naturalist who is known as the "father of ichthyology".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pink-backed pelican</span> Species of bird

The pink-backed pelican is a bird of the pelican family. It is a resident breeder in the swamps and shallow lakes of Africa and southern Arabia; it has also apparently extirpated in Madagascar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Common basilisk</span> Species of lizard

The common basilisk is a species of lizard in the family Corytophanidae. The species is endemic to Central America and South America, where it is found near rivers and streams in rainforests. It is also known as the Jesus Christ lizard, Jesus lizard, South American Jesus lizard, or lagarto de Jesus Cristo for its ability to run on the surface of water.

<i>Systema Naturae</i> Major work by Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus

Systema Naturae is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomenclature, was partially developed by the Bauhin brothers, Gaspard and Johann, Linnaeus was first to use it consistently throughout his book. The first edition was published in 1735. The full title of the 10th edition (1758), which was the most important one, was Systema naturæ per regna tria naturæ, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis or translated: "System of nature through the three kingdoms of nature, according to classes, orders, genera and species, with characters, differences, synonyms, places".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Swallow-tailed kite</span> Species of bird

The swallow-tailed kite is a pernine raptor which breeds from the southeastern United States to eastern Peru and northern Argentina. It is the only species in the genus Elanoides. Most North and Central American breeders winter in South America where the species is resident year round.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ani (bird)</span> Genus of birds

The anis are the three species of birds in the genus Crotophaga of the cuckoo family. They are essentially tropical New World birds, although the range of two species just reaches the United States.

<i>Pseudis</i> Genus of amphibians

Pseudis is a genus of South American frogs in the family Hylidae. They are often common and frequently heard, but easily overlooked because of their camouflage and lifestyle, living in lakes, ponds, marshes and similar waters with extensive aquatic vegetation, often sitting at the surface among plants or on floating plants, but rapidly diving if disturbed. Whereas the adults are medium-sized frogs, their tadpoles are large; in some species the world's longest.

<i>Pseudis paradoxa</i> Species of amphibian

Pseudis paradoxa, known as the paradoxical frog or shrinking frog, is a species of hylid frog from South America. Its name refers to the very large—up to 27 cm (11 in) long—tadpole, which in turn "shrinks" during metamorphosis into an ordinary-sized frog, only about a quarter or third of its former length. Although the recordholder was a tadpole in Amapá that belonged to this species, others in the genus Pseudis also have large tadpoles and ordinary-sized adults.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shaft-tailed whydah</span> Species of bird

The shaft-tailed whydah or queen whydah is a small, sparrow-like bird in the genus Vidua. During the breeding season the male has black crown and upper body plumage, golden breast and four elongated black tail shaft feathers with expanded tips. After the breeding season is over, the male sheds its long tail and grows olive brown female-like plumage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Satyrus (ape)</span>

Satyrus is a species of ape described in some medieval bestiaries. It is said to always give birth to twins. Of these twins, it hates one, but loves the other. The ape is also described as lively and having a pleasant face. The satyrus was one of many creatures from folklore included in early editions of Carl Linnaeus' Systema Naturae, alongside other legendary creatures, under the wastebasket taxon of Animalia Paradoxa. In translation, Linnaeus is quoted as saying that the satyrus is "hairy, bearded, with a manlike body, gesticulating much, very fallacious, is a species of monkey, if ever one has been seen."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Worm</span> Limbless invertebrate animal

Worms are many different distantly related bilateral animals that typically have a long cylindrical tube-like body, no limbs, and no eyes.

10th edition of <i>Systema Naturae</i> Book by Carl Linnaeus

The 10th edition of Systema Naturae is a book written by Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus and published in two volumes in 1758 and 1759, which marks the starting point of zoological nomenclature. In it, Linnaeus introduced binomial nomenclature for animals, something he had already done for plants in his 1753 publication of Species Plantarum.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jack-knifefish</span> Species of fish

The jack-knifefish is a species of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Sciaenidae, the drums and croakers. It is native to the western Atlantic Ocean, where its distribution extends along the eastern coasts of the Americas from the Carolinas in the United States to Brazil, including the Caribbean. Other common names include donkey fish and lance-shaped ribbonfish.

In the 10th edition of Systema Naturae, published in 1758, the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus described 554 species of bird and gave each a binomial name.

In the 10th edition of Systema Naturae, Carl Linnaeus described the Amphibia as:

Animals that are distinguished by a body cold and generally naked; stern and expressive countenance; harsh voice; mostly lurid color; filthy odor; a few are furnished with a horrid poison; all have cartilaginous bones, slow circulation, exquisite sight and hearing, large pulmonary vessels, lobate liver, oblong thick stomach, and cystic, hepatic, and pancreatic ducts: they are deficient in diaphragm, do not transpire (sweat), can live a long time without food, are tenatious of life, and have the power of reproducing parts which have been destroyed or lost; some undergo a metamorphosis; some cast (shed) their skin; some appear to live promiscuously on land or in the water, and some are torpid during the winter.

Plagiuri is an early biological subclassification of fish. The term was invented by Artedi, and is derived from the Greek πλαγιος and ουρα. The Pisces Plagiuri included those animals then classed as fish whose tails' flat surfaces faced anatomically up and down and not sideways. Its members have now been shown to be mammals.

References

  1. von Linné, C. (1744). Caroli Linnæi medic. & botan. in acad. Upsaliensi professoris ... Systema naturæ: In quo proponuntur naturæ regna tria secundum classes, ordines, genera & species. Sumptibus Michaelis-Antonii David. p. 102. Retrieved 2015-04-05.
  2. Tore Frängsmyr; Sten Lindroth; Gunnar Eriksson; Gunnar Broberg (1983). Linnaeus, the man and his work. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. pp. 176–177. ISBN   0-7112-1841-2.
  3. Sandra Knapp (2002). "Fact and fantasy". Nature . 415 (6871): 479. Bibcode:2002Natur.415..479K. doi: 10.1038/415479a . PMID   11823837. S2CID   44480097. Also available on Scribd. Linnaeus remarked in edition 6 (as translated) as at this link: "I have come to these conclusions by personally leading my pupils on wanderings through the tangled web of nature, in order that I can spur others on to an examination and explanation of nature rather than the reiteration of perceived ideas ... I shall take exception to the tales of actors and the barkings of dogs with equal measure.".
  4. S. W. Garman (1877). "Pseudis, the paradoxical frog". The American Naturalist . 11 (10): 587–591. doi:10.1086/271961. JSTOR   2447862. S2CID   86511142.
  5. Dobson, Andy; Lafferty, Kevin D.; Kuris, Armand M.; Hechinger, Ryan F. & Jetz, Walter (2008). "Homage to Linnaeus: How many parasites? How many hosts?" (PDF). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . 105 (Suppl. 1): 11482–11489. Bibcode:2008PNAS..10511482D. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0803232105 . PMC   2556407 . PMID   18695218.
  6. 1 2 Carl Linnaeus, Systema naturae (1735; facsimile of the first edition), trans. M. S. J. Engel-Ledeboer and H. Engel (Nieuwkoop, Netherlands: B. de Graaf, 1964), 30. via
  7. Jan Bondeson (1999). "Spontaneous generation". The Feejee Mermaid and Other Essays in Natural and Unnatural History. Cornell University Press. pp. 193–249. ISBN   978-0-8014-3609-3.
  8. Hulme, F.E. (1886). Myth-land. S. Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington. p. 168. Retrieved 2015-04-05.
  9. von Linné, C. (1740). Systema naturae in quo naturae regna tria: secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, systematice proponuntur. Apud G. Kiesewetter. p. 66. Retrieved 2015-04-05.
  10. Peter Artedi, 1738, Philosophia Ichthyologica, p. 81.