Catesby, Mark. Appendix Pl. 20, Buffalo

Mark Catesby (1638 - 1749)Etching with hand color, paper dimensions: approximately 19 x 14 inchesFrom the Appendix (Part 11) to Catesby's Natural History of Carolina, Florida & the Bahama IslandsLondon: 1747 - 1771 Currently known as the American buffalo, Bison bison and rose locust, Robinia hispida*, Catesby described these subjects as follows:  BISON AMERICANUS.  THIS beast I have already described in the Account of Beasts, p. 27. but having then by me only a sketch of the Animal, which I thought not sufficient to make a true figure from, I have since been enabled to exhibit a perfect likeness of this awful Creature.  The following is the author’s text relating to the Buffalo that appears in volume I, page 27: THESE Creatures, tho' not so tall, weigh more than our largest Oxen; the Skin of one is too heavy for the strongest Man to lift from the Ground; their Limbs are short but very large, their heads are broad, their Horns are curved, big at their Basis, and turn inward; on thei