14-Cianfanelli 79-87

Atti Soc. Tosc. Sci. Nat., Mem., Serie B, 119 (2012) pagg. 79-87; doi: 10.2424/ASTSN.M.2012.12 SIMONE CIANFANELLI (*), GIANNA INNOCENTI (*), LUCA BARTOLOZZI (*) THE RESEARCH ON INVERTEBRATE FAUNA AT THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM, FLORENCE UNIVERSITY Abstract - Natural History Museums, born in the XVIII century, are often represented, including animals - most fre- have evolved with the emergence of new technologies and with the quently vertebrates but also invertebrates. Among the evolution of new social-scientific issues. Research activity has been carried on several aspects, from the classic faunistic studies or the invertebrates, molluscs, crustaceans and the insects systematics and taxonomy of various groups of invertebrates to the were, for their beauty of form and colour, often repre- research that arises from the national and international legislation sented with great precision into works of art. In the and the new challenges posed by climate change and globalization. nineteenth century had also come to use the practice Key words - Collections - Research - Invertebrates - Natural History to teach young noblewomen to collect specimens of Museum. particular beauty, such as the shells that were often imported from the so-called «new lands». Riassunto - La ricerca sulla fauna invertebrata al Museo di Storia Na- The birth of the Natural History Museums goes hand turale, Università di Firenze - I Musei di Storia Naturale, nati nel XVIII secolo, si sono, nel corso del tempo, evoluti adeguandosi al in hand with the great scientific expeditions of the late nascere di nuove tecnologie ed all’emergere di nuove problematiche eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries. socio-scientifiche. L’attività scientifica degli esperti del Museo di Sto- The purpose was to gather, collect and study every- ria Naturale dell’Università Firenze è quindi svolta su diversi fronti, thing that was still unknown and that came from exot- da quello classico dello studio faunistico e della sistematica e tasso- nomia di vari gruppi di invertebrati, a quello della ricerca in risposta ic countries still unexplored and unknown. With the alle nuove legislazioni nazionali ed internazionali ed alle problemati- zoological collections the need to place the specimens che scaturite dai cambiamenti climatici e dalla globalizzazione. was born, classifying them with a unique name, there- Parole chiave - Collezioni - Ricerca - Invertebrati - Museo di Storia fore the binomial classification of Linnaeus was even- Naturale. tually chosen as the best worldwide. In the nineteenth century scientific names to a huge number of living beings were then given and a priority INTRODUCTION became the need of preserving them in museums where scholars could view them for their research and also the Natural history collections were born in Europe in the people could finally beaware of the wonders of nature. XVIII century and they were initially created by indi- In Tuscany, the first natural history collections were viduals often of high rank, with large financial re- made from the most powerful noble families in Flo- sources in order to bring the beauty and curiosity of rence and the Medici family collected a lot of objects nature that could be shown to a small circle of educat- which, in the late eighteenth century, merged in «La ed and selected guests. Specola», presently the Natural History Museum of The preparations were placed in environments called the University of Florence. «cabinet of wonders» or «Wunderkammer» that were The Imperial Royal Museum of Natural History in nothing more than the first simple and unconscious at- Florence was among the first to open its doors to all (it tempts to give life to a real museum of natural history. was inaugurated in 1775), but it diversified the visiting In fact, what we call at present «biodiversity» was al- hours between the common people and the aristocra- ready, albeit naive, admired by those who felt to bring cy. The Natural History Museums, with their first and together all the strange and wonderful specimens that essential functions, the research and educational work were not a human creation, but that derived from the were therefore born and since then their growth and «divine creativity». transformation by adapting to the socio-cultural and The beauty of nature, even before being assembled scientific changes have been continuous. and shown in its entirety and physically in appropriate places, was always reproduced by men in all forms of art. In prehistoric caves, drawings or engravings were DISCUSSION already representing animals or plants that were close- ly related to human life. In mosaics, sculptures, paint- Contrary to popular opinion, Natural History Muse- ings, tapestries, architectural friezes nature subjects ums are not static institutions; their research and con- (*) Museo di Storia Naturale dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Sezione di Zoologia «La Specola», via Romana 17, 50125 Firenze, Italia. 80 servation are constantly evolving and changing with the Cephalopods (Targioni Tozzetti, 1869; Borri et al., use of new technologies in response to new questions 1988) and the description of new species of terrestrial posed by the scientific and socio-cultural development. gastropods from Tuscany such as Vitrina bonellii (Tar- In «La Specola» Museum, as it is commonly called the gioni Tozzetti, 1873). Zoological Section of the Museum of Natural History, The ability of the directors and curators to convey and University of Florence, the collections of inverte- encourage «amateur» experts permitted to have the ex- brates, among the most important in Italy, are derived pertise for the reorganization of the stored material, largely from the research that was carried out from the moreover the acquisition of important collections in the time of its foundation until today. second half of the nineteenth century, were created by Research issues have changed and evolved over the eminent malacologists: Vittorio Pecchioli (1790-1870) years, what once was almost exclusively pure research with the purchase in 1874 of the collection of land and today is sometimes applied, meeting the multiple needs freshwater molluscs; Vittorio Uzielli with the donation of public administrations and adaptation to national in 1894 of continental and marine molluscs; Giovanni and international guidelines. Caramagna (1830-1895) with land- and seashells, includ- For this reason, researches conducted on invertebrates ing the shell types from Assab, Red Sea (Caramagna, are not limited to the classical taxonomy, systematics, 1888) which was donated to the Museum in 1897, and expansion and enrichment of the collections (helmin- in particular the collection of Marianna Paulucci Panci- thological, malacological, carcinological, entomological, atichi-Ximenes (1835-1919) with malacological material etc.) by means of research and collection campaigns in that, with regard to the land-shells, is considered the Italy and abroad, but are also realized with the imple- most important of Italy and which is still a reference mentation of projects commissioned by various govern- point for malacological researches. The Paulucci collec- ment agencies. tion was donated in 1898 (Barbagli & Borri, 2002) and is The latest regional, national and international laws presently fully deposited in the Museum of Natural His- and regulations often require the implementation of tory in Florence, with 161 types of taxa described by directives to which the public authorities, at different Paulucci available to the scientific community (Cianfa- levels, must meet, and this fact poses the Museum, nelli & Manganelli, 2002). These collections are still enti- with its researchers, as their natural referent. rely preserved in the Museum of Natural History of Flo- Modern research frontiers are therefore opened with rence and all the scientists that contributed to forming the use of new technologies, such as genetic analysis this collection, together with the then director Adolfo and electron microscopy. Climate change and human Targioni Tozzetti, supplied to the research and the defi- activities due to globalization force researchers to face nition of the national malacofauna that, in those years new issues, such as biological invasions of non-native when the unification of Italy was defined, was consid- species. The scientific research is consequently carried ered as one of the milestone in science, for the creation out towards new issues, while maintaining the original of a national identity (Manganelli et al., 2002). For some features of a Natural History Museum, is also increas- of these scientists exhibitions and conferences were or- ingly linked to practical aspects of daily life. ganized to remember their role in the growth of the natural sciences in our country and to revive the historical memory of «La Specola» in Florence (AA.VV., 2006; THE RESEARCHES ON THE ZOOLOGICAL GROUPS Manganelli & Cianfanelli, 2002; Manganelli et al., 2009). In the twentieth century we can remember other Malacological researches scholars and directors of the museum that dedicated themselves to research and enrichment of the malaco- History logical collections. Giuseppe Colosi (1892-1975) stud- ied some Italian land shells, such as Testacellidae, Li- The malacological collections start practically from the macidae and Arionidae, and the study was not only foundation of the Museum, with specimens from the limited to morphology but also to their anatomy Medici collections, where there were among them

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