Beyond the footnote: Rewriting the Scientific Archive From the Margins
- Bethan Burnside
- 6 days ago
- 10 min read
Drawn in by its iconic cool-green, die-cut leaf design, I instinctively picked up a copy of FUKT #22 magazine at the Atheneum in Amsterdam. And while it was filled to the brim with lush nature-inspired drawings, there was one image that would etch itself permanently into my memory: a photograph of Marianne North, poised with her easel in front of a giant cactus in Ceylon, now Sri Lanka, in 1877. At age 39, North defied the convention of her time and decided to leave her home of the British Isles to embark on a solo expedition to research plants in their natural environments. Spanning seventeen countries—including Australia, Brazil, Japan, Borneo, and Tenerife—North illustrated over seven hundred types of plants, many of which had been completely unknown in Europe, and several of which had subsequently adopted her namesake, such as the Northia seychellana, Nepenthes northiana, and Crinum northanium.
Through the same article by Max Parnell, I learned that Marianne North was just one of numerous female naturalists who defied social norms and ventured on scientific quests across the world between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. The text referenced the 2023 academic paper titled “Female naturalists and the patterns of suppression of women scientists in history: the example of Maria Sibylla Merian and her contributions about useful plants”, where authors Fernanda Mariath and Leopoldo Baratto document no less than 28 female naturalists who participated in research trips or who were collectors of natural history during this period.
