In the same year about 250 specimens had been acquired in London at the auction of the world famous Leverian Museum, including
birds collected during James COOK's second and third voyages. Between 1817 - 1835 Johann NATTERER, son of the first curator,
collected more than 12.000 bird skins in Brazil, most of them still admired by our visitors and forming an invaluable basis
for scientific research. For many papers published in scientific journals the material still offeres important information
which could not have been acquired elsewhere.
In the course of the years many famous collectors and scientists contributed ornithologic material to the ever growing collection,
among them C. v. HÜGEL, Th. HEUGLIN, I. PFEIFFER, C.L. BREHM, C.J. TEMMINCK, R. BOWDLER SHARPE, P.L. SCLATER, A. REISCHEK,
V.R. v. TSCHUSI, R. GRAUER, A.B. MEYER, O. FINSCH, EMIN PASHA, G. SCHIEBEL, F. SEILERN and others.
curators of the bird collection: Josef NATTERER sen. (until 1823), Josef NATTERER jun. (until 1851), Johann Jakob HECKEL (until
1857), August v. PELZELN (until 1888), Ludwig LORENZ v. LIBURNAU (until 1915), Moriz SASSI (until 1940), Günther NIETHAMMER
(until 1946) Moriz SASSI (until 1949), Gerth ROKITANSKY (until 1972), Herbert SCHIFTER (until 1994), Ernst BAUERNFEIND (until
2011), Anita GAMAUF (since 2011).
Even after 1765, when the Empress MARIA THERESIA changed the status of the museum from private imperial property to a public
federal institution, the greatest part of the collections still remained in the Castle of Vienna, the so called "Hofburg".
Lack of space ultimately made a new representative building for the natural history collections an inevitable necessity and
finally the present "Naturhistorisches Museum Wien" was opened with great splendour in 1889.
Fortunately almost all of the materials deposited at any time in the collection are still extant and during more than 220
years of existence only inconsiderable losses have occurred due to decay, fire or war times.
American White Pelican (Pelecanus erythrorhynchos), a mount from the former Leverian Museum (before 1806). Photo: A. Schumacher
Series of study skins of the Great Grey Shrike (Lanius excubitor) (coll. V. v. TSCHUSI). Photo: A. Schumacher
Huia (Heteralocha acutirostris) from New Zealand, extinct c. 1907. Photo: A. Schumacher
Holotype of the Western Red-necked Arassari (Pteroglossus Sturmii NATTERER, 1842). Photo: A. Schumacher
Ruff (Philomachus pugnax), male displaying (coll. J. NATTERER). Photo: A. Schumacher
