bavarikon4UDescription
At the beginning of the eighteenth century, the artist and naturalist Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) wrote to the Nuremberg physician and botanist Johann Georg Volkamer (1662-1744) with whom she had close business and scientific ties. After returning from her dangerous expedition to the tropical rainforests of South America, she provided information on the development of her main work, the "Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium". She described her diverse work as a researcher, starting with collecting caterpillars, breeding them and finally the dissecting of the insects. As a businesswoman, she offered her customer exotic specimens and worried about the difficult funding of her new work, which appeared in large format and was to make her world-famous. Since Merian left no autobiography and no self-portrait, her letters are the most important testimonies of an extraordinary life as researcher and artist at the beginning of the Age of Enlightenment. This longest of all preserved Merian letters gives an overall impression of the author's life and work after her return from Suriname: she ordered the specimens she brought with her and recorded her research results in drawings on parchment. She also described the difficulties that arose when printing such an elaborate work. For the funding of her large book project on insects in Surinam, she hoped for subscribers and offered specimens of naturalia as well as already published books for sale.
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