Jacob Theodor Klein as a collector of the nature drawing and an associate of illustrators and engravers

Jakubowski, Jakub

doi:1230-1159

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Title: Jacob Theodor Klein as a collector of the nature drawing and an associate of illustrators and engravers

Abstract:

Jacob Theodor Klein (1685–1759) was one of the most prominent collectors and naturalists operating in Gdańsk in the 18th century. Apart from natural specimens, he was gathering nature drawings, acquired from sources such as Samuel Niedenthal’s body of work or Hiob Ludolf’s legacy. In the mid-1720s, Klein commissioned David Schultz, a draughtsperson based in Gdańsk, to produce visual documentation of the Museum Kleinianum. Afterwards, the task was taken over by two of Klein’s daughters, Dorothea Juliana Gralath and Theodora Renata Klein, who made in-situ studies of selected museum exhibits with the former designing vignette illustrations for her father’s editions as well. Engravings modelled after the nature drawings from Klein’s collection often illustrated his scientific publications. Earlier ones, from the late 1720s and early 1730s, were made by Gdańsk-based Peter Böse and Johann Friedrich Mylius; later ones, from the mid-1730s to the end of the 1740s, by professional artists from Nuremberg, Leipzig and Halle on the Saale, among whom Georg Wolfgang Knorr, Johann Wilhelm Stör and Johann Michael Seligmann deserve special mention. Klein’s work consolidated the naturalist community of Gdańsk and promoted academic networking within the region.