Introduction xi 



Gaza of Thessalonica, the most celebrated Scholar of his day, 

 who, fleeing from the sack of Constantinople, played a con- 

 spicuous part in the rise of the " New Learning," and after a 

 course of teaching in Rome, entered successively the service 

 of the Popes Nicholas the Fifth and Sixtus the Fourth, 

 eventually dying in poverty in Lucania about 1484. 



Exact transcription of a text was considered by no means 

 necessary in those days: consequently we find many obser- 

 vations and explanations inserted in the text of Aristotle 

 and Pliny, which had no place in the original 1 . 



Besides referring to Gesner, Turner mentions other learned 

 men by name and occasionally quotes from their works; 

 while his pages also inform us of many places that he visited. 



The following excerpts from Gesner not only give in- 

 stances of correspondence between him and Turner, but also 

 shew that the former was accustomed to correct the latter 

 from his wider knowledge of Ornithology. 



De Branta vel Beniida... (p. 107). 



Ide [Turnerus] post librum suum de avibus publicatum, 

 in epistola ad me data, Berniclas siue Brantas (inquit) ex 

 putridis nauis malis fungorum more nasci, minime fabulosum 

 esse doctorum & honestorum uirorum oculata fides mihi per- 

 suasit. Branta anserem palustrem ualde refert : his tamen 

 notis ab eo differt. Branta breuior est, a collo quod rubescit 

 nonnihil, ad medium usq., uentrem, qui candicat, nigra est. 

 anserum more segetes populatur. In Vuallia (quae pars est 

 Angliae) in Hibernia & Scotia aues istae adhuc rudes & im- 

 plumes in littore, sed non sine forma certa & propria auis 

 passim inueniuntur. Et rursus, Praeter brantam aut berniclam 

 est alia auis, qua; originem suam arbori refert acceptam. 

 Arbores sunt in Scotia ad littus maris crescentes, e quibus 

 prodeunt ueluti fungi parui, primum informes, postea pau- 

 latim integram auis formam acquirunt, perfectae tandem 

 magnitudinis illae, rostro aliquantisper pendent, paulo post 

 in aquam decidunt, & turn demum uiuunt. Hoc tot tantaeq, 

 integritatis uiri affirmauerunt ut credere audeam, & aliis cre- 

 dere suadea. Haec ille. Eliota Anglus &c.... 



1 The precise references to Aristotle and Pliny are now supplied, from 

 the texts of Aubert and Wimmer, and Sillig respectively. 



