Richard Owen, who was to found London's Natural History Museum, stands beside the skeleton of a giant moa. Owen had been given a 15-centimetre bone in 1839 (he is holding it in his right hand), and from this deduced that a large flightless bird had lived in New Zealand.
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
National Library of New Zealand, General Lending Collection
Reference:
Richard Owen, Memoirs on the extinct wingless birds of New Zealand. Vol 2. London: John Van Voorst, 1879, plate XCVII.
Permission of the National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.
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