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best of natural history
![Sex and Science in Robert Thornton’s Temple of Flora](https://the-public-domain-review.imgix.net/essays/sex-and-science-in-robert-thornton-s-temple-of-flora/flora-carnations.jpg?w=600&h=1200)
Sex and Science in Robert Thornton’s Temple of Flora
Bridal beds, blushing captives, and swollen trunks - Carl Linnaeus' taxonomy of plants heralded a whole new era in 18th-century Europe of plants being spoken of in sexualised terms. Martin Kemp explores* how this association between the floral and erotic reached its visual zenith in Robert Thornton's exquisitely illustrated Temple of Flora. more
![Richard Spruce and the Trials of Victorian Bryology](https://the-public-domain-review.imgix.net/essays/richard-spruce-and-the-trials-of-victorian-bryology/21518166034_0c4e164667_b.jpg?w=600&h=1200)
Richard Spruce and the Trials of Victorian Bryology
Obsessed with the smallest and seemingly least exciting of plants — mosses and liverworts — the 19th-century botanist Richard Spruce never achieved the fame of his more popularist contemporaries. Elaine Ayers explores the work of this unsung hero of Victorian plant science and how his complexities echoed the very subject of his study. more
![Visions of Algae in Eighteenth-Century Botany](https://the-public-domain-review.imgix.net/essays/visions-of-algae-in-eighteenth-century-botany/conferva-zoom.jpg?w=600&h=1200)
Visions of Algae in Eighteenth-Century Botany
Although not normally considered the most glamorous of Mother Nature's offerings, algae has found itself at the heart of many a key moment in the last few hundred years of botanical science. Ryan Feigenbaum traces the surprising history of one particular species — Conferva fontinalis — from the vials of Joseph Priestley's laboratory to its possible role as inspiration for Shelley's Frankenstein. more
![Decoding the Morse: The History of 16th-Century Narcoleptic Walruses](https://the-public-domain-review.imgix.net/essays/decoding-the-morse-the-history-of-16th-century-narcoleptic-walruses/35133002452_fed59da9f1_o.jpg?w=600&h=1200)
Decoding the Morse: The History of 16th-Century Narcoleptic Walruses
Amongst the assorted curiosities described in Olaus Magnus' 1555 tome on Nordic life was the morse — a hirsute, fearsome walrus-like beast, that was said to snooze upon cliffs while hanging by its teeth. Natalie Lawrence explores the career of this chimerical wonder, shaped by both scholarly images of a fabulous North and the grisly corporeality of the trade in walrus skins, teeth, and bone. more