Coote, Anne

2013

Visiting Sydney in 1845, a young French tourist, Eugène Delessert, was agreeably surprised by the advanced state of the town's commercial development and particularly impressed by the array of native birds on show in the Hunter Street establishment of the natural history dealer, John William Roach. During his time in this colonial capital Delessert, as he reported later, often enjoyed gazing at the brilliantly coloured plumage of the several hundred birds which fluttered among the shrubs inside Roach's large aviary. The parrots and pigeons delighted him, but equally remarkable, he thought, was the lovely Regent Bower Bird, a study in velvet black and brilliant gold. Sydney dealers, Delessert informed his readers, had this bird for sale in quite large numbers. The existence of such a trade in native species, as Delessert would have understood, signalled that a good many people in this far-flung colonial outpost shared the cultural and intellectual engagement with natural history which was common in the metropole. Indeed, businesses like that of Roach with their novelty, noise and colour apparently found a ready market in mid-nineteenth century Sydney, with six trading for varying periods during the 1840s, and at least seven in each of the following two decades, although not all at the same time. This article examines the character of mid-nineteenth century shop-front natural history enterprise and considers its significance for the inhabitants of Sydney and its visitors.

Sydney Journal, 4(1), p. 1-18

1835-0151

https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/14152

en

University of Technology Sydney ePress (UTS ePress)

Science, Fashion, Knowledge and Imagination: Shopfront Natural History in 19th-Century Sydney

Journal Article

Publication