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SUMMARY:James Cuninghame – 'a learned and most industrious promoter of n
 atural philosophy' - Charlie Jarvis (Natural History Museum)
DTSTART:20170306T130000Z
DTEND:20170306T140000Z
UID:TALK69768@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Edwin Rose
DESCRIPTION:By any standards\, James Cuninghame FRS (ca. 1665–1709) led 
 a remarkable life. A Scot trained in medicine in Leiden\, he participated 
 in four voyages bound for Asia\, as a surgeon or trader\, and discussed hi
 s discoveries with major figures of the time in natural philosophy in Lond
 on\, notably Hans Sloane\, James Petiver\, Leonard Plukenet and John Woodw
 ard. He narrowly escaped death in attacks on East India Company (EIC) fact
 ories in Pulo Condore (Vietnam) and Banjarmassin (Borneo)\, and was impris
 oned in France\, the Canary Islands and Cochinchina\, but he never failed 
 to be an enthusiastic and conscientious collector\, acquiring specimens of
  both natural and artificial objects (including hundreds of pressed plants
 \, insects and shells\, and watercolours of plants by native artists)\, as
  well as items of trade interest (tea samples\, china clay\, a scarlet dye
 \, maps\, a Chinese compass)\, wherever he touched land. Although probably
  best known as one of the first people to bring extensive natural history 
 collections from China (chiefly from Amoy (Xiamen) and Chusan (Zhoushan)) 
 to Europe\, Cuninghame also made collections in the Canary Islands\, Ascen
 sion\, St Helena\, the Cape of Good Hope\, Java\, Malacca\, Pulo Condore a
 nd Cochinchina\, all of which are among the earliest that survive from man
 y of these locations. New research is shedding light on the contexts in wh
 ich Cuninghame travelled. His Amoy voyage\, for example\, is now known to 
 have to have taken place on an interloping ship rather than one belonging 
 to the EIC – remarkable in the context of trade with China at this time.
LOCATION:Seminar Room 1\, Department of History and Philosophy of Science
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