Wooden barrels for transporting and preserving natural history specimens in the eighteenth century

Abstract

When transporting specimens, both living and preserved, naturalists often took great care when deciding how best to ship them. One of the most important shipping methods was in wooden barrels. In the eighteenth century, many naturalists, including Joseph Banks, John Ellis, and René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur, advocated the use of, or used, barrels to transport specimens when long voyages often caused specimens to become damaged or destroyed. This paper will investigate the use of wooden barrels by naturalists and detail how such a ubiquitous object proved to be exceptionally important in the history of natural history.