History
The first intense and continuous scientific study of a cave animal was of a cave salamander, Proteus anguinus. It was originally identified as a "dragon's larva" by Janez Vajkard Valvasor in 1689. Later, the Austrian naturalist Joseph Nicolaus Lorenz described it scientifically in 1768.
Another early scientific description of a cave salamander was performed by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque in 1822 while he was a professor of botany and natural history at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky. The species he described was known to the locals as a "cave puppet" and is now known to be Eurycea lucifuga. His discovery was not surprising at the time because E. lucifuga inhabits near the entrance of caves, thus an in-depth exploration was not required; and, E. lucifuga is neither blind nor depigmented.
Read more about this topic: Cave Salamanders
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“America is, therefore the land of the future, where, in the ages that lie before us, the burden of the World’s history shall reveal itself. It is a land of desire for all those who are weary of the historical lumber-room of Old Europe.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“There is no history of how bad became better.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Philosophy of science without history of science is empty; history of science without philosophy of science is blind.”
—Imre Lakatos (1922–1974)