Clara's Grand Tour: Travels with a Rhinoceros in Eighteenth-Century Europe

by Glynis Ridley

Book Overview

In 1741, an enterprising Dutch sea captain transported a young female Indian rhinoceros from Assam to Europe, where she was displayed before everyone from peasants to princes. In an age before railways and modern roads, the three-ton Clara, as she became known, had to travel in an enormous coach drawn by eight horses. For seventeen years she journeyed across mainland Europe and Britain: she became a favorite of heads of state, including Frederick...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0871138832
• ISBN13: 9780871138835
• Release Date: February 2005
• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
• Length: 222 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.9" x 8.7"

Customer Reviews

Interesting but a bit slow in places

I enjoyed reading this book. It provides an insight into an age long ago when life was more limited geographically, and something as simple as seeing what a rhinocerous looks like was a special event. The book moved a bit slowly in places since the author described the entire tour in a fair amount of detail. However, in the end I appreciated the thoroughness of the description. The only real weak point was that it left me wishing that there had been more photographs of the playbills, medallions, and etchings which are mentioned in the text. But other than that, it is definitely worth reading.

A wonderfully entertaining and enlightening read!

Glynis Ridley has written a delightful book, informative, entertaining, and sparkling with fascinating insights into everything from the travel habits of 18th-century Europeans to the Biblical iconography of the rhino. This is a must read for anyone interested in Europe in the age of Enlightenment.

"Clara's Grand Tour" - A Good Read

As an endangered species program manager, "Clara's Grand Tour" provided me with intriguing insights into the historical captive maintenance and display of a species now considered to be endangered. Ridley, using historical references and subsequent narratives on Clara's travels, does a fair job of synthesizing the information. (I applaud her on her efforts to appreciate the difficulities inherent in rhino captive maintenance; her visit(s) to the Cincinnati Zoo rhino collection was admirable!) Ridley attempts to fill in the blanks where the record is incomplete; her discussions of similar period ventures with other rhinos are particularly insightful. I also enjoyed the portions of the book that describe early animal collections, efforts to describe the species, early natural history writers, etc. Ridley's writing style/technique at times left me wondering, though. For example, in Chapter 1, Ridley describes a "renaissance of interest" in classical Graeco-Roman texts describing various species. She goes on to describe the unavailability of specimens to validate these textual descriptions, stating that African animals brought from the interior were generally unavailable for viewing because they were single specimens "conspicuously lacking in the sort of bulk and ferocity that made transportation overland both time-consuming and complex." I don't get this. While there are a few other places containing similarly garbled trains of thought, perhaps one of the most egregious oversights in this book is the failure of the author to include illustrations of Van de Meer's original souvenir posters and coins. With this being said, I did enjoy the book, plan to re-read it, and look forward to reading some of the additional cited references. I believe that this book rates three or four stars, and give it four largely for content.

Introducing the Rhinoceros to Europe

If you can't get to the zoo, you can at least turn on the Discovery Channel, or a lot of others, and see scary, huge, exotic beasts that have no chance of showing up in your home town. In the eighteenth century, however, the options were quite a bit less, and so an enterprising fellow with a rhinoceros might be able to make an impression. In the case of Douwemout Van der Meer, and his rhinoceros Clara, he not only made an impression all over Europe, he substantially changed the science and art of the time, and he made a fortune. A curious book, _Clara's Grand Tour: Travels with a Rhinoceros in Eighteenth Century Europe_ (Atlantic Monthly Press) by Glynis Ridley now tells the story, an odd one about a strange and distant time, and about a strange endeavor. There are gaps in the story, because Van der Meer did not keep a journal, but Ridley has also included diverting details about the cities Clara visits and the people she meets. The result is an engaging history, and one more valuable look at how humans get along with animals. Clara's mother was shot when Clara was but a few months old in India, and the sea captain Van der Meer purchased her, thinking that she would make his fortune. He sailed with her back to his home in Holland, and with Clara safely transported, he left the Dutch East India Company to get on with what would be his real career. He was an ingenious showman, who used many techniques that would be familiar in modern spectacles. He had posters printed up beforehand to announce Clara's arrival, and would sell copies of the poster to anyone who paid to see her. There were also more elaborate or detailed pictures for the better-off to buy, ranging from woodcuts to engravings to commemorative medals in tin or silver. Clara seems to have been cared for with genuine affection. She lived on hay and grass (150 pounds a day), with bread and beer being special treats. She was attracted to the smell of tobacco, and could be easily led by the temptation of an orange. Clara toured throughout Europe starting in 1741, with various home visits to Leiden, and died on tour in London in 1758. At her death, she probably became the subject of anatomists, and Van der Meer went back home. Significantly, there are no written records of him after Clara's death. It is to be assumed that he retired on his profits. He and Clara had accomplished a good deal more than just making money, however, as this happy and enthralling narrative make clear. They were making an appeal to popular curiosity, which is an amiable enough trait, and they satisfied it, but they also satisfied the artists and naturalists who came to check her out. They had expanded human knowledge, making the rhinoceros so well known that Boswell could report in agreement that someone had said that Dr. Johnson "laughs like a rhinoceros," and could count on people being amused at the simile. Ridley's book happily lets us rejoin in the enlightenment which Clara brought.

The rhinoceros and the unicorn

It didn't matter who you were in mid-18th century Europe - peasants and princes alike paid a travelling Dutch sea captain just so they could see his long-term female companion - a 6ft high, 12ft long, 12ft round Indian rhinoceros called Clara. What was the big deal? Well, from the third century onwards, no one had managed to bring a rhinoceros alive to Europe, so no one knew if they even existed. Writers guessed that rhinoceroses and unicorns might be one and the same thing. But no one had seen one so no one knew. Maybe ancient writers just made them up? (Incidentally, as we didn't get a rhinoceros in a US zoo until the 1880s, we can't say early Americans were any better informed.) Enter Captain Van der Meer in 1741 with Clara - the only rhino in Europe. He gets fabulously rich displaying her - she becomes the model of artists and sculptors. Scientists study her and princes feed her oranges. Style gurus accessorise hair and clothes for men and women to look like her!! The book is full of amazing stories, like Clara being rafted down the river Rhine, but there's a serious point to it too - showing how we learn about the natural world and how man's attitude to the natural world has changed across time. This is a prize-winning history that's full of information as well as being a really good read. I recommend it.