Sibylla Merian, 'Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium'

Maria Sibylla Merian was born in Frankfurt in 1647. She came from a family of artists, scholars, and booksellers. She learned painting and engraving from her father, stepfather, and stepbrothers. In 1665, she married the painter Johann Andreas Graf. She became interested in insects. With endless patience, she raised caterpillars into butterflies. She studied their metamorphosis and documented everything in words and images in two books on caterpillars, which she published together with her husband in 1679 and 1683.

When her marriage began to falter, she moved to the Netherlands in 1685 with her two daughters and her mother, to the Labadist colony near Wieuwerd, where she would stay for six years and divorce her husband. Meanwhile, she had become fascinated by the giant moths from Suriname. So much so, that at the age of 52 she decided to travel to Suriname with her daughter to personally study the flora and fauna there. 

She must have been a remarkable woman. Her stay in Suriname (1699-1701) was shorter than she had intended because she fell ill, but it lasted long enough to create a large number of paintings of plants and insects. Maria Sibylla died in 1717.

In 1705, the result of her research appeared: the Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium. The book consists of sixty colored engravings in very large format (29.5 x 39.5 cm) of butterflies and other insects. Crucial to the book is that all caterpillars and butterflies are depicted on their host plants. Merian drew caterpillars, the pupa, and the butterflies (from above and below). The butterflies are drawn life-size. Each plate is accompanied by a scientific description. All her drawings were transferred to copper engravings, which were then colored by hand. Merian also used a special technique, counter-pressure, with which a result was achieved that is hardly distinguishable from an original watercolor.

The text accompanying the illustration shown next to this text is mainly about the banana:

This fruit is called banana in America; it serves as a substitute for apples and has a pleasant taste, just like apples in Holland. They are good cooked and uncooked; when still unripe, they are light green, while ripe ones are lemon yellow inside and out [...].

Regarding caterpillar, pupa, and butterfly, she writes:

On this tree I found this light green caterpillar, with whose leaves I fed her until April 21st, when she shed her skin, became a little pupa, and on May 10th transformed into such a beautiful little owl.

Editions of Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium also appeared in French and Latin. In 2016, the KB published a facsimile edition of the book in collaboration with publisher Lannoo, containing the original texts and plates supplemented with essays on the life and work of Merian.