CHAPTER XVI 



ANIMAL LUMINESCENCE 



I. Luminous Terrestrial and Freshwater forms 



Fireflies and Glowworms 



EARLY SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY VIEWS 



THE IMPETUS which cntomology received from the studies of Aldro- 

 vandi and Muffet carried into the seventeenth century. Even 

 before Muffet's Insectorum sive Minimorum Animalium Theatrum 

 (1634) was published posthumously, most writers described the glow- 

 worm and firefly in natural histories, or in connection with other 

 matters. After Aldrovandi and Muffet came the Neapolitan physi- 

 cian and naturalist, Fabio Colonna or Columna (1567-1647), best 

 known for his beautifully illustrated books on botany. He included 

 " Noctiluca terrestris " in his Aquatilium et Terrestrium Aliquot 

 Animalium, etc. (Romae, 1616) . The account described the animal 

 minutely, and included a woodcut, reproduced in figure 4, an easily 

 recognized glowworm.^ The skill of the illustrator had advanced, 

 in comparison with the figures of Aldrovandi's book (see fig. 4) but 

 was still far from the superb hand-colored insect drawings of the 

 eighteenth century. 



As an Italian familiar with fireflies, Colonna took pains to point 

 out that, although " it shines like fire at nisrht," as do the cicindelae 

 (Greek lampyres) , the common winged kind, " it does not glitter 

 by the spread of its wings . . . nor does it become obscure when 

 pressing them together, the way the older writers describe the 1am- 

 pyris." Hence he applied the name, " Nyctilampes aptera " in Greek 

 or " Noctiluca terrestris " in Latin, because they live on the ground 

 rather than in the air, and, " walking at nio^ht like cockroaches, in 

 their sideways motion the fiery radiance of their buttocks shines 

 forth . . . with such light that a page with very small type can be 



^Johann Amos Comenius or Komensky (1592-1670), in his book. The gate of lan- 

 guages unlocked, or a seedplot of all arts and sciences, containing a ready way to learn 

 the Latin and English tongues (London, 1652) , made a distinction between the Latin 

 terms for fireflies and glowworms. In Chapter 19, " De Insectis," it was pointed out 

 that cicadas, cockroaches, etc., were " small creatures divided almost asunder by par- 

 titions, and having life in one part, when it is parted from the other." He then defined 

 hepioli (pyraustae) and cicindelae (lampyrides) as fireflies or candleflies, while 

 nitedulae (noctilucae) were glowworms. 



538 



