In 'De piscium auditu [On the sense of hearing in fishes]', the first part of Jacob Theodor Klein's Historiae piscium naturalis (1740-1749), Klein provided the earliest specialized treatise on the sense of hearing in fishes. In contrast to many authorities past and present, Klein hypothesized that fishes do indeed hear and that they not only have organs of hearing but also external auditory passages by means of which water-borne sounds are communicated to these organs. His work is reviewed and analyzed, with emphasis on his detailed experimental search for structures comparable to the outer and middle ear of mammals, and his prophetic suggestions regarding the structure, function, and practical utility of the 'pebbles' found in the crania of fishes, now known as otoliths.

In the earliest published account of fish otoliths, Swedish physician and naturalist Magnus von Bromell (1679–1731) produced a brief but nonetheless remarkable publication titled ‘De piscium lapillis’, in which he declared ‘fish pebbles’ or ‘ichthyoliths’ (now known as otoliths) to be of great interest and strongly encouraged their study. A transcription and English translation of the original Latin is provided, with a discussion of the impact his study had on subsequent research.

Eye-witness accounts of a living “panther”, a leopard, two tigers and a hyena, appended to “Idea institutionum Trichozoologiae”, an unpublished manuscript on mammal classification by Swedish naturalist Peter Artedi (1705–1735), made during a visit to London sometime between early November 1734 and June 1735, are described. Interest is focused on his account of the hyena, which appears to have been the only modern source for Carl Linnaeus, who acknowledged Artedi in the first edition of Systema naturae. Evidence is provided to show that Artedi's account was accurate and original, having never had the opportunity to witness the animal previously.  

Among several manuscripts left behind by Swedish naturalist Peter Artedi following his untimely death in 1735 is an unfinished effort to classify the mammals, or the 'hairy animals', as Artedi called them. Titled 'Idea institutionum Trichozoologiae' ('An outline of the principles of the science of hairy animals'), it presents a four-tier hierarchy composed of orders, sections ('sectio'), genera and species, that foretells the work of Carl Linnaeus. An analysis of the impact that Artedi's account might have had on Linnaeus's treatment of the mammals in the various editions of his Systema naturae is presented. Results show that both authors owed much to the earlier work of English naturalist John Ray, with precedent going back to Aristotle.

A mid-eighteenth-century copy of a manuscript containing taxonomic accounts of a collection of fishes from Ambon and Suriname, originally prepared by the Swedish naturalist Peter Artedi (1705-1735) for use in the third volume of Albertus Seba's Locupletissimus rerum naturalium thesauri accurata descriptio (1759), is described. Unknown to historians of natural history prior to 1941 when it was briefly introduced by zoologist Daniel Merriman (1908-1984) of Yale University, the origin and circuitous history of ownership of the manuscript is traced from Amsterdam to its recently discovered presence in the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. The manuscript is important because it holds the only known evidence as to what part of the published accounts in the Thesaurus belongs to Artedi and what part was altered by subsequent editors. The manuscript contains a large number of errors - often misspellings and grammatical inconsistencies, which are probably the result of careless reading on the part of the copyist - but a close examination shows that the factual contents of Artedi's text were not changed. Although embellished in various ways, what we see today in Seba's account is a faithful interpretation of Artedi's contribution.

John Hill (1714–1775), a brilliant man of many talents, was extremely productive, having produced more than a hundred books and pamphlets on a wide range of subjects, but despised by most contemporaries for his egotistical, argumentative, and provocative manner and for his slanderous writings that resulted in many heated disputes, among scientists and literati alike. Rejected in his attempts to join the Royal Society of London, he began a campaign of criticism and derision against the Society, its president, Martin Folkes (1690–1754), and the Philosophical Transactions, by publishing, under a pseudonym, satires on the Society that destroyed his chances of ever being elected to that body. Accusations of plagiarism followed much of his work. A previously unnoticed example of his wholesale lifting of the classification of fishes published in 1738 by Swedish naturalist Peter Artedi (1705–1735), is described. As for the Royal Society, Hill’s persistent satirization, which was mixed with sound critical advice, is said to have done more to improve the quality of the Philosophical Transactions than any other contemporary effort.

An English translation of the Swedish naturalist Peter Artedi’s great masterpiece Ichthyologia sive opera omnia piscibus (1738) has allowed for an increased understanding of the importance of his work to ichthyology and to the history of biosystematics in general. The opportunity to study Ichthyologia in English for the first time emphasizes like never before Artedi’s thoroughly modern approach. His description of the European Perch, Perca fluviatilis Linnaeus, 1758, is provided as an example of the extent to which he applied his methodology to a specific taxon.

A manuscript catalogue of the fishes of the Baltic Sea, and of the rivers and lakes of Sweden, the only known original work of the Swedish ichthyologist Peter Artedi (170535) by his own hand, is translated into English for the first time, and its contents assessed in light of Artedi's contribution to the development and philosophy of Linnaean systematics. Appended accounts of Swedish cetaceans and terrestrial mammals are also discussed, as well as Artedi's 'principles of ichthyology', the methodology later employed in his magnum opus, the Ichthyologia of 1738. Evidence that Artedi presented the manuscript to Sir Hans Sloane as a way to introduce himself during his visit to London in 1734 is also provided.

Peter Artedi (1705-1735) was a Swedish doctor, naturalist, and author of Ichthyologia (Leiden 1738), a book enjoying the reputation of being a pioneering work that has never been translated into any vernacular language. This paper demonstrates Artedi's innovative and consistent method of work through a Swedish translation of his treatment of one sincle species, Clupea maxilla inferiore longiore, maculis nigris carens "Strömming" in Volumes III, IV, and V of Ichthyologia. These three instalments are compared with the article on Clupea Harengus (Linn. 1758), "Herring", authored by Sir Francis Willughby (1636-1672) and John Ray (1627-1705), both of the Royal Society of London.