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This painting is an illustration from the Codex Ixtlilxochitl (Mexico, 16th Century). It represents the Aztec water god Tlaloc and is notable for its uneasy conjunction of Precolumbian and European style. The illustration accompanies La relacion de Texcoco, by Juan Bautista Pomar, a mestizo official in the village of Texcoco who was descended from the Aztec rulers. (Mexico: Splendors of Thirty Centuries [New York 1990], p. 275). Color Engraving by Peter Pelham. American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Mass. B&W This image and the others by Mark Catesby are from his Natural History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands(London, 1731-43). Catesby was a British naturalist who wrote the book and engraved the prints himself, based on his observations in America from 1712 to 1726. His work was sponsored by the Royal Society and was the first broad study of American flora and fauna in English. It was also unusual at the time for its attempt to portray animals in motion accurately with characteristic plants from their natural habitats. (W. Graham Arader III, Native Grace: Prints of the New World 1590-1876 [Charlottesville, Virginia: Thomasson-Grant, 1988]The Ilathera Duck is the Bahama pintail or white-cheeked pintail, a rare bird from the Bahama Islands. The plant is the sea ox-eye, or sea-bush. (Native Grace, p. 45) According to Arader, there were many bison in the south- eastern piedmont region of North America when Catesby was there in the 1720s, but they had all been killed by 1800. (Native Grace, p. 33) Catesby, Blue Grosbeak/Sweet Flowering Bay) Native Grace, p. 5. Catesby, Green Lizard of Jamaica This chameleon is portrayed on a tropical logwood, which produced a dark dye that was the cause of occasional strife between Spanish and English colonists (Native Grace, p. 42). This is the only portrait of Boone from his lifetime. It was painted by Chester Harding in 1820, just before Boone died at the age of 85. Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston. Reproduced from Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke's America (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1973), p. 157. There are no reliable portraits of Columbus from his lifetime. This one was painted by Sebastiano del Piombo shortly after Columbus's death in 1506. Metropolitan Museum of Art. Reproduced from Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke's America (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1973), p. 27. Painted in the 1640s. American Antiquarian Society. Reproduced from Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke's America (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1973), p. 80. This painting depicts Washington's ascent into heaven, a motif within the more general apotheosis of Washington in the years after his death in 1799. While many of theliterary and visual works on this theme share the crude, exaggerated style seen here, this painting is unusual because as Cooke observes it was done on glass by a Chinese artist, probably for sale in America. There was a flourishing trade in glass and other decorative arts between China and the United States during this period. The Henry Francis duPont Winterthur Museum. Reproduced from Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke's America (New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1973), p. 134. "Pocahantas" (1830) by Sully, Thomas, 1783-1872 from History of
the Indian Tribes of North America, with Biographical sketches and Anecdotes of
the Principal Chiefs. Embellished with On Hundred and Twenty Portraits, from
the Indian Gallery in the Department of War, At Washington, vol. 3,
(Philadelphia, PA: J.T. Bowen, 1848). "Chippeway Widow" from: History of the Indian tribes of North America, with BIographical Sketches and Anecdotes of the Principal Chiefs. Embellished with one hundred and twenty portraits, from the Indian Gallery in the Department of War, Washington, vol. 2. Publisher: D. Rice and J.G. Clark, Philadelphia, 1849.
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