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Scenes from Deep Time: Early Pictorial Representations of the Prehistoric World
How did the earth look in prehistoric times? Scientists and artists collaborated during the half-century prior to the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species to produce the first images of dinosaurs and the world they inhabited. Their interpretations, informed by recent fossil discoveries, were the first efforts to represent the prehistoric world based on sources other than the Bible. Martin J. S. Rudwick presents more than a hundred rare illustrations from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to explore the implications of reconstructing a past no one has ever seen.
294 pages, Hardcover
First published December 15, 1992
60 people want to read
About the author
Martin J.S. Rudwick
10 books10 followersMartin John Spencer Rudwick is a British geologist, historian, and academic. He is an emeritus professor of History at the University of California, San Diego and an affiliated research scholar at Cambridge University's Department of History and Philosophy of Science.
His principal field of study is the history of the earth sciences; his work has been described as the "definitive histories of the pre-Darwinian earth sciences".
Rudwick was awarded the Sue Tyler Friedman Medal in 1988. In 2008, he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA). He was the recipient of the 2007 George Sarton Medal from the History of Science Society.
His principal field of study is the history of the earth sciences; his work has been described as the "definitive histories of the pre-Darwinian earth sciences".
Rudwick was awarded the Sue Tyler Friedman Medal in 1988. In 2008, he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA). He was the recipient of the 2007 George Sarton Medal from the History of Science Society.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 17, 2018
Long time since I Read this book but remember that I loved it. If you like the idea of old paintings of who they thought the ancient times looked, this is the book for you. This is also my type of coffe-tabel-book. If I had a coffe table. Or owned the book... I need to get this book. And possibly a coffe tabel.
July 11, 2023
A book passed on to me and one that I thought would be fairly decent as it explains how the museum-like exhibits plus other poising of now extinct prehistoric creatures came to be over time from its first origin to its more modern portrayals. But although deep time can cover more than the age of the now extinct prehistoric creatures that came way long before humans it focus is on those creatures who led the planet before us.
Out of seven chapters I could only mostly swallow down three of them and a good chunk of the fourth before having to call quits. The first chapter is focused on explaining that although religious artwork of the Middle Ages wasn't of deep time subjects the methods and styles that were used by these artists to capture such divine subjects would later be copied by those who dedicated their lives to unraveling the prehistoric world and the animals that inhabited it to help both past as well modern observers to get a grasp of what this world was like.
And then it slowly goes into what it meant to find the fossil skeletons, to put the animals together and explore their world through comparison of them to more modern yet similar beasts. And very, very slowly the reader is introduced to the art mode required to portray these creatures as well as how it came to be. All of this would have been most definitely quite interesting to me but I just felt myself slogging due to the dull, lengthy and repetitive writing of Martin J. S. Rudwick.
The book's pages were split so on one half there was the text for the actual book you were meant to be reading and then on the inner half of the page what was meant to be captions for included artwork illustrations. The reason why I said was meant to be is since the author chose instead of including captions to briefly mention whatever thoughts or required information was necessary to pass onto the reader he would include huge excerpts from various literature of that time to explain the piece whether it was taken from a pamphlet or a book. And when I mean these were huge excerpts there were some that went on for several pages before sometimes ending with a further breakdown of terms that readers may not know about thus providing a bit of a glossary.
Meanwhile the book does include just as much various samples of artwork both of those that influenced the new art genre and models/artwork of deep time that would be early examples of the fledgling field. Unfortunately all of these were in black-and-white while with the match of publishing size it made it quite hard for the reader to be able to notice the small details thus requiring an "interpretation" from the author on what was an important aspect of the piece for readers to take note of.
As a result I must say if I were to tackle this book again I would most definitely just skim through the excerpts and artwork first on their own merit then choose to read the rest of the book afterwards without trying to mix the two groups. As for now I just cannot make myself to sit still any further with a promising book that has so clearly failed to capture my attention on what in many other cases would be a very interesting topic....
Out of seven chapters I could only mostly swallow down three of them and a good chunk of the fourth before having to call quits. The first chapter is focused on explaining that although religious artwork of the Middle Ages wasn't of deep time subjects the methods and styles that were used by these artists to capture such divine subjects would later be copied by those who dedicated their lives to unraveling the prehistoric world and the animals that inhabited it to help both past as well modern observers to get a grasp of what this world was like.
And then it slowly goes into what it meant to find the fossil skeletons, to put the animals together and explore their world through comparison of them to more modern yet similar beasts. And very, very slowly the reader is introduced to the art mode required to portray these creatures as well as how it came to be. All of this would have been most definitely quite interesting to me but I just felt myself slogging due to the dull, lengthy and repetitive writing of Martin J. S. Rudwick.
The book's pages were split so on one half there was the text for the actual book you were meant to be reading and then on the inner half of the page what was meant to be captions for included artwork illustrations. The reason why I said was meant to be is since the author chose instead of including captions to briefly mention whatever thoughts or required information was necessary to pass onto the reader he would include huge excerpts from various literature of that time to explain the piece whether it was taken from a pamphlet or a book. And when I mean these were huge excerpts there were some that went on for several pages before sometimes ending with a further breakdown of terms that readers may not know about thus providing a bit of a glossary.
Meanwhile the book does include just as much various samples of artwork both of those that influenced the new art genre and models/artwork of deep time that would be early examples of the fledgling field. Unfortunately all of these were in black-and-white while with the match of publishing size it made it quite hard for the reader to be able to notice the small details thus requiring an "interpretation" from the author on what was an important aspect of the piece for readers to take note of.
As a result I must say if I were to tackle this book again I would most definitely just skim through the excerpts and artwork first on their own merit then choose to read the rest of the book afterwards without trying to mix the two groups. As for now I just cannot make myself to sit still any further with a promising book that has so clearly failed to capture my attention on what in many other cases would be a very interesting topic....
January 12, 2018
I was happy to learn about the critical 1830-1860 period with the publication of the earliest "scene from deep time" by De La Beche (Duria antiquior, 1830) and its links to Mary Anning and Buckland, the 3D dinosaur models built for the 1851 Great Exhibition (at the famous Crystal Palace, London), or Louis Figuier's Earth Before The Deluge (1863). However the text could have been condensed. It was often boring and it felt that it had been written for experts in art and history of science rather than for the layman. Too bad also that it's entirely in b&w, knowing that some of the depicted scenes were originally watercolors.
April 29, 2021
Engaging look at how art and paleontology have influenced each other
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews