Raffles’ Ark Redrawn – Natural History Drawings from the Collection of Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles

Raffles’ Ark Redrawn is a fully illustrated catalogue of the 120 natural history drawings of the Raffles Family Collection, acquired by the British Library in 2007.

The story of these colourful drawings of plants, birds and mammals, by Chinese and French artists, is a dramatic one, as the majority were made for Raffles on Sumatra in a mere ten weeks in early 1824 after the ship bearing Raffles’ original collection caught fire. The present drawings are those made to replace the lost ones, together with some earlier drawings made in Penang for William Hunter.

HJ Noltie
Softcover, 180 pages, 138 colour & 17 b/w illustrations.