In 1775, a visitor to Laurent Spinacuta's Grande Ménagerie at the annual winter fair in Paris would have seen two tigers, several kinds of monkeys, an armadillo, an ocelot, and a condor—in all, forty-two live animals. In Elephant Slaves and Pampered Parrots, Louise Robbins explains that exotic animals from around the world were common in eighteenth-century Paris. In the streets of the city, residents and visitors could observe performing elephants and a fighting polar bear. Those looking for unusual pets could purchase parrots, flying squirrels, and capuchin monkeys. The royal menagerie at Versailles displayed lions, cranes, an elephant, a rhinoceros, and a zebra, which in 1760 became a major court attraction.
For Enlightenment-era Parisians, exotic animals both piqued scientific curiosity and conveyed social status. Their availability was a boon for naturalists like Buffon, author of the best-selling Histoire naturelle, who observed unusual species in a variety of locations around the city. Louis XVI saw his menagerie as a manifestation of his power and funded its upkeep accordingly, while critics used the caged animals as metaphors of slavery and political oppression amidst the growing political turmoil. In her engaging and often surprising account, Robbins considers nearly every aspect of France's obsession with exotic fauna, from the vast literature on exotic animals and the inner workings of the oiseleurs' (birdsellers') guild to how the animals were transported, housed, and cared for. Based on wide-ranging and imaginative research, Elephant Slaves and Pampered Parrots stands as a major contribution to the history of human-animal relations, eighteenth-century culture, and French colonialism.
Louise E. Robbins is an independent scholar and an editor at Cornell University Press. She has a doctorate in history of science from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations and TablesAcknowledgmentsIntroductionChapter 1. Live CargoChapter 2. The Royal MenagerieChapter 3. Fairs and FightsChapter 4. The Oiseleurs' GuildChapter 5. Pampered ParrotsChapter 6. Animals in PrintChapter 7. Elephant SlavesChapter 8. Vive la LibertéEpilogueAbbreviationsList of Primary ResourcesBibliographical EssayIndex
What People are Saying About This
Richard Burkhardt
"Eighteenth-century Paris abounded with animals captured in faraway places and brought to the French capital. Louise Robbins has done a masterful job recapturing this phenomenon, bringing it to the attention of modern readers, and making sense of it. She reconstructs the diverse material, social, and cultural settings in which exotic animals played a role. At the same time, she analyzes the multiple meanings French observers derived from these animals in their midst. The reader will find here a wealth of insights regarding the ways ideas about human social relations have influenced representations of animal behavior or human-animal relations, and vice versa. This is a marvelous book, wonderfully researched and engagingly written."
Robert Forster
"An impressive work that uses exotic animals as a vantage point from which to expose the behavior and attitudes of Parisians, not only toward the animals themselves but also toward a range of important issues in French history."
From the Publisher
Eighteenth-century Paris abounded with animals captured in faraway places and brought to the French capital. Louise Robbins has done a masterful job recapturing this phenomenon, bringing it to the attention of modern readers, and making sense of it. She reconstructs the diverse material, social, and cultural settings in which exotic animals played a role. At the same time, she analyzes the multiple meanings French observers derived from these animals in their midst. The reader will find here a wealth of insights regarding the ways ideas about human social relations have influenced representations of animal behavior or human-animal relations, and vice versa. This is a marvelous book, wonderfully researched and engagingly written.—Richard Burkhardt, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
An impressive work that uses exotic animals as a vantage point from which to expose the behavior and attitudes of Parisians, not only toward the animals themselves but also toward a range of important issues in French history.—Robert Forster, The Johns Hopkins University
[A] beautiful, indeed wonderful . . . learned, engaging book . . . Dr. Robbins is not afraid to tackle difficult questions.—Orest Ranum
Orest Ranum
"[A] beautiful, indeed wonderful... learned, engaging book... Dr. Robbins is not afraid to tackle difficult questions."
