3-021-357 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Skeletons of the Dinornis in the Canterbury Museum, New Zealand, 1868. Engraving from a photograph of the '...Dinornis, or Moa, an extinct gigantic bird of New Zealand...[found in] a peat swamp at Glenmark, in the province of Canterbury...Dr. T. [sic] Haast, F.R.S., the Government geologist of Canterbury, has made further extensive excavations in the same locality...The result of these excavations was exceedingly satisfactory, as Dr. Haast obtained bones of more than a hundred specimens, belonging to about twelve species of the Dinornis. From these, with the able assistance of Mr. Fuller, taxidermist, six complete, or nearly complete, skeletons were articulated for the Canterbury Museum at Christchurch - namely, those of the Dinornis giganteus (Owen), a bird standing 10ft. high; the Dinornis robustus, 8 ft. 5 in.; the Dinornis elephantopus, 5 ft. 3 in,; the Dinornis crassus, 4 ft. 4 in.; the Dinornis casuarinus, 5 ft. 2 in.; and the Dinornis didiformis, which is 4 ft. 3 in. high...Mr. D. L. Mundy...executed a series of photographs of them for the Canterbury Government. In order to show the comparative size of the different species, the skeletons were grouped together, and a spectator introduced'. From "Illustrated London News", 1868.