Beautiful 19th-Century Illustrations of Every Known Hummingbird Species in One Dynamic Poster
Before photography, it was up to illustrators to accurately record plants and animals. In the 19th century, artist John Gould set out to capture all of the known species of hummingbirds at the time, which meant traveling to different continents to observe their appearances. Ultimately, these efforts culminated in A Monograph of the Trochilidæ, or Family of Humming-Birds, a five volume series of 360 hand-colored lithographic plates.