The Tradescant Collection Poem by Sheena Blackhall

The Tradescant Collection
In 1638, a detailed description of the collection and its contents was recorded by a German traveller named Georg Christoph Stirn, here set out as a list poem

Two ribs of a whale,
A very ingenious little boat of bark
All kinds of foreign plants,
A salamander, a chameleon, a pelican,
Everything, in truth, except the Ark

A remora, a lanhado from Africa,
A white partridge, a goose which has grown in Scotland on a tree,
A flying squirrel, a squirrel like a fish,
So many strange and curious things to see

All kinds of bright coloured birds from India,
A number of things changed into stone,
Gourds, olives, an ape's head, a cheese
Different kinds of shells, the hand of a mermaid,
A piece of human flesh on a bone,

The hand of a mummy,
A very natural wax hand under glass,
All kinds of precious stones,
Coins, a picture wrought in feathers,
Things exquisite and crass

A small piece of wood from the Calvary cross of Christ,
Pictures in perspective of Henry IV and Louis XIII of France
Looking rather hopeful
(who are shown, as in nature, on a polished steel mirror)
Pictures from the church of S. Sophia in Constantinople

Two cups of rinocerode, a cup of an E. Indian alcedo
(which is a kind of unicorn)
Turkish and other foreign shoes and boots,
A sea parrot, a toad-fish, an elk's hoof with three claws,
Articles pictured from their shoots to roots

A bat as large as a pigeon,
A human bone weighing 42 lbs.,
Indian arrows used by the executioners in the West Indies
An instrument used byJews in circumcision,
Curiosities chosen on interesting grounds

The robe of the King of Virginia,
Goblets of agate, a girdle such as the Turks wear in Jerusalem,
The passion of Christ carved very daintily on a plumstone,
Every manner and brilliance of natural gem

A large magnet stone, a S. Francis in wax under glass,
A St. Jerome, the Pater Noster of Pope Gregory,
Pipes from the East and West Indies,
All rare and catalogued most painstakingly

A beautiful present from the Duke of Buckingham
Of gold and diamonds affixed to a feather
Isidor's MS of de natura hominis,
Beautiful weird and strange all shown together

A scourge with which Charles V is said to have scourged himself,
A hat band of snake bones.
Such an Aladdin's cave of Nature's wonders
Everything there except the Callanish stones