Behavioral Cetology in the 19th Century: Thomas Beale, Henry Cheever, Thomas Southwell and Their Role in Awakening a Cetacean Protection Consciousness

Abstract

Although naturalists have devoted attention to cetaceans since Antiquity, it was only in the 19th century that cetology underwent a true explosion. Three key cetological works of this period are The Natural History of the Sperm Whale (1839) by Thomas Beale, The Whaleman's Adventures in the Southern Ocean (1850) by Henry Cheever and The Seals and Whales of the British Seas (1881) by Thomas Southwell. Importantly, these three works did not only represent fundamental compendia of scientific knowledge of cetaceans, but also had a crucial role in awakening a cetacean protection consciousness. Indeed, by describing in detail the behavior and psychology of these animals, these works depicted cetaceans as capable of cognition and emotions, facilitating empathy from the readers and challenging the general audience to consider critical issues connected to whale hunting, such as animal suffering and species extinction. From a behavioral point of view, Beale and Cheever, among the first naturalists that had direct experiences with living whales, refuted the previous dominant view of the whale based on the monothematic stereotype of the “bloodthirsty” “monster of the deep,” and described instead a more complete and scientifically accurate ethogram of whales, underscoring how these animals actually express a wide range of complex emotions, including joy, playfulness, maternal affection, filial affection, social affection to non-kins, defensive attitudes towards conspecifics in danger and succorant attitudes towards injured members of their pod. Moreover, these three works are milestones not only in the history of behavioral biology, but also in the history of environmentalism. Indeed, these works innovatively started presenting the whales object of hunting as sentient victims undergoing great sufferings and mass-slaughter, rather than as mere monsters to defeat. This new view of the whale represented the first step of a change of attitude in the public opinion, that, over the course of the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, progressively shifted its sympathy from the whale hunters to the whales, leading to the rise of cetacean protection movements. We here analyze these three works, underlining in particular their contributions to behavioral cetology. The rediscovery of these works will be important not only for cetology and behavioral sciences, but also for history of science, anthropology, ethics, animal rights, and ecocriticism.