The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations
“ The voyage of HMS Endeavour (1768-1771) was the first devoted exclusively to scientific discovery. The Botany Library at the Natural History Museum holds all of the surviving botanical artwork from Captain James Cook's first Pacific voyage. Represented are works of the artists Sydney Parkinson (1745-1771), John Frederick Miller and Frederick Polydore Nodder, among others. These artists' works feature in the finished watercolours made during and after the voyage, between 1773 and 1784. Of the three, only Parkinson sailed on the ship and it was he who made the first sketches of the plants which were encountered and collected.”