Collected before 1800

Public

Natural history specimens collected before 1880 provide a remarkable record of the world's biodiversity at a time when many landscapes and ecosystems had not yet undergone the profound transformations associated with modern agriculture, urbanisation and industrialisation. Each specimen preserves information about a species and its occurrence at a particular place and moment in history. Recovering the geographical information associated with these historical collections can therefore provide valuable baselines for understanding past species distributions and comparing them with those observed today. This project brings together specimens collected before 1880, helping to reconnect historical biodiversity records with the places where they were originally collected. These records can contribute to research on biogeography, biodiversity, ecology, conservation and environmental change, while also preserving the geographical legacy of some of the world's earliest natural history collections.