RECORD: Anon. n.d. Abstract of Blumenbach, Handbuch der vergleichenden Anatomie. CUL-DAR193.96. Edited by John van Wyhe (Darwin Online, http://darwin-online.org.uk/)

REVISION HISTORY: Transcribed by Christine Chua and edited by John van Wyhe 8.2022. RN1

NOTE: See record in the Darwin Online manuscript catalogue, enter its Identifier here. Reproduced with permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library and William Huxley Darwin. The volume CUL-DAR193 contains notes for Darwin's book Variation under domestication (1865-75).

This document is not in Darwin's hand and was written by a German.


[96]

Notiz zud Ch. Darwin. Das Variiren I. 1868. pag. 317 Protuberanz des Schaedels beiden polnischen Huhn Auszug aus J. F. Blumenbach. Handbuch der vergleichenden Anatomie. Goettingen 1805. pag 85. (Nota)

"Eine bewundernswerthe Sexual verschiedenheit zeigt sich am Schaedel der Hollenhühner, als bei welchen der Stirntheil der Hirnschale wie zu einer monstrosen Blase aufgetrieben wird, auf welcher dann ihr grosser Federbusch sitzt.— Eine erbliche Abweichung des Bildungstriebs, die meines Wissens ausserdem im ganzen Thierreich ihres Gleichen nicht hat

Stobaeus. in Act. literar. Suec. vol III. 1780. pag. 53

Pallas in Spicileg. Zolog. fasc. IV. pag. 22

Sandifort in Mus. anat. acad. Lugd. Bat. vol I. p. 306." {[marginal insertion by Darwin:] Sexual difference in Polish Fowl.

—— pag. 538. (Nota)

"Ich habe neuerlich mehrere Koepfe solcher Hollenhühner frisch untersucht und gefunden dass der so sonderbar aufgetriebene Vordertheil der Hirnschale durch die Hemisphaerien des eigentlichen oder grossen Gehirnsgefällt; — und dieser Theil der Hirnschalenhoehle von dem hinteren (Theil) der wie bei den gemeinen Hennen das kleine Gehirn fasst, durch eine auffallende Verengerung derselben abgesondert wird."

(NB. Das Hollenhuhn ist das Hauben=Huhn)

[Variation 2d ed. 1: 270: "At the present day all the breeds of Polish fowls have the great bony protuberance on their skulls, which includes part of the brain and supports the crest, equally developed in both sexes. But formerly in Germany the skull of the hen alone was protuberant: Blumenbach,58 who particularly attended to abnormal peculiarities in domestic animals, states, in 1805, that this was the case; and Bechstein had previously, in 1793 observed the same fact. This latter author has carefully described the effects on the skull of a crest not only in the case of fowls, but of ducks, geese, and canaries. He states that with fowls, when the crest is not much developed, it is supported on a fatty mass; but when much developed, it is always supported on a bony protuberance of variable size.
58 'Handbuch der vergleich. Anatomie,' 1805, p. 85, note. Mr. Tegetmeier, who gives in 'Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,' Nov. 25th, 1856, a very interesting account of the skulls of Polish fowls, not knowing of Bechstein's account, has disputed the accuracy of Blumenbach's statement. For Bechstein, see 'Naturgeschichte Deutschlands,' Band iii. (1793), s. 399, note. I may add that at the first exhibition of Poultry at the Zoological Gardens, in May, 1845, I saw some fowls, called Friezland fowls, of which the hens were crested, and the cocks furnished with a comb."]


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