Antique specimens

A blog reader recently contacted me offering a fantastic gift/donation which I gratefully accepted. Tyrone from Basingstoke, Hampshire was clearing the attic of his great Grandfathers house and came across a collection of old Victorian anatomical specimens. Tyrone knew of my interest in such things and I have just taken possesion of some twenty five of them. I am currently cataloguing and cleaning them as several are in a very poor state. I wanted to show some of them on my blog.

 Most jars are numbered and labelled, stating the contents. These images here are of some particuallarly fascinating ones desribed as 'specimen ghosts' of varying sorts. They do indeed seem to be solid manifest entities with solid (white) flesh, if thats the right term, and some even seem to have an internal anatomical structure visible within. The ghosts are generally of small animals or insects. and seem relatively well preserved in their alchohol solutions.

 l'm currently researching how to clean, conserve and re-seal several jars which definitely have something within but which are so murky and clouded that its impossible to see the contents properly. One, No. 278 is labelled 'flying frog from Guatemala', others as 'unknown creature'