Anthropologist invented new animal to fool friend, whose secret could not be revealed for 100 years – Life & Style

Hardly anyone in Pakistan knows John James Audubon, but Audubon is famous in every school in America, and why not, there is an entire organization named after him. He was a naturalist and ornithologist who used his extraordinary painting skills to produce one of the most important books on American birds.

Audubon was the primary authority on nature and animal subjects in his day. It is not surprising, therefore, that what Audubon said on the subject was accepted as fact without any verification.

But what would your reaction be if I told you that the mastermind behind the best-selling book “The Birds of America” ​​was guilty of making up entire species of animals as a joke?

To understand why an intelligent man like Audubon could be interested in spreading such a big lie, you have to start with Constantine Rafinesque.

Constantine was considered the most intelligent man of his time. He studied a little bit of everything from botany, anthropology to linguistics. He was born near Constantinople and traveled throughout America.

In 1818, Constantine Samuel Rafinsky was collecting plant and animal specimens in the lower reaches of the Ohio River valley. During this expedition, he often met or stopped to stay with fellow botanists and naturalists. Similarly, he gained access to the home of painter and naturalist John James Audubon in Henderson, Kentucky, in August of that year.

Constantine Samuel Rafinsky

He thought that some of the plants seen in the background of Audubon’s paintings might be new species.

So what could be better for a learner than to spend time with the foremost authority on American flora and fauna.

But little did he know that surprising events were waiting for him.

History shows that Constantine was not a well-liked figure. People may find him a little arrogant or aloof because of his genial nature. According to author John Jeremiah Sullivan, Audubon is the only person on record who actually liked Constantine.

Now it was a friendly joke, or perhaps an element of insanity in Constantine that Audubon started telling him about species of animals that never actually existed.

And of course, since he was considered an authority on the subject, Constantine never thought to question the bogus information he was being fed.

The information on these fake species was too subtle to catch on immediately, and each one was described as having a characteristic that didn’t make sense.

This animal, called the Brindled Stimator, was claimed to have cheek pouches outside its mouth.

Audubon sketched 11 unknown species of fish, including a 10-foot-long devil-jack diamondfish with what he described as bulletproof scales.

According to a paper in the Archives of Natural History, Audubon also created two birds, a “trivalve” mollusk-like creature, three snails and two plants. He also created nine “wild mice”.

Black-eared mouse

But why did Audubon do this to Constantine? In fact, Audubon woke up one night to find Constantine running around the room naked, waving his favorite violin in the air, trying to kill bats that had entered through the open window. Constantine thought it was a new species of bat and wanted to catch it. Meanwhile, Audubon’s violin was broken, and the angry Audubon took the remains of the violin from him and finished the work.

And so Audubon decided to teach Constantine a lesson, perhaps in revenge.

But they say that there must be an act of deception, so it happened. Audubon also got a taste of his own mischief, when one of his own assistants made a fool of him.

A friend of Audubon’s, John Graham Bell, was traveling with him in the 1840s as his assistant and taxidermist, the two being separated for a week for some reason. When Audubon left, Graham Bell stitched together the heads, bodies, and legs of various birds to create a strange creature.

John James Audubon

Audubon was shocked to see the creature, weeks later when Graeme Bell confessed, Audubon was embarrassed but soon saw the humor in Graham Bell’s trick and forgave him.

But Audubon never admitted the prank he played on Constantine, even Constantine gave credit to Audubon for discovering several fake animals, but it took a hundred years to unravel the mystery.