Anna Maria Hussey’s Mushroom Illustrations
The Art and Science of Britain's First Female Mycologist
Some of the finest mushrooms ever recorded on paper, the plates of Anna Maria Hussey’s Mushroom Illustrations render British fungi in exact, full-colour detail.
Book Description
Some of the finest mushrooms ever recorded on paper, the plates of Anna Maria Hussey’s Mushroom Illustrations render British fungi in exact, full-colour detail.
Anna Maria Hussey is often regarded as Britain’s first female mycologist. She painted these plates with her sister Frances Reed, for the work originally titled Illustrations of British Mycology, issued in parts between 1847 and 1855. Through careful fieldwork, the two women drew each one where it grew, among the leaves and insects of its habitat, capturing the exact characteristics of every one – the sheen of a cap, the flush of a bruised stem, the strange forms of the fly agaric and the stinkhorn.
Hussey wrote the accompanying text herself, filling the book with her own sharp, funny wit. Her field notes are precise, added alongside her knowledge of foraging, dissecting, cooking, and often the folklore behind the curious fungus. She worked at a time when few women were credited in the sciences, and, combined with her illustrations, she produced one of the most striking and groundbreaking works on the subject. Hussey’s plates remain among the most beautiful ever made of British fungi, and are a tribute to the women who quietly built the foundations of the field.
This edition showcases the landscape of Victorian mycology and the women who helped define it, bringing together facsimile plates from Hussey’s original work and a collection of period writings that frame it in the context of nineteenth-century science.
Publisher's Note
For the naturalist, the forager, and anyone who loves a beautifully drawn mushroom, Anna Maria Hussey’s Mushroom Illustrations gathers her finest paintings of British fungi, among the loveliest of the Victorian age.
Hussey’s mushroom illustrations tell the story even without her words. Her watercolour paintings of mushrooms are just delightful, born of pure scientific observation while still holding an artistic sensibility. The care she took in creating them is evident in each tiny detail; she captured the essence of each specimen in an intuitive yet scientific and authentic way. You just have to read her field notes to understand the depth of knowledge she had about her subject matter, and the joy she found in discovering them. She was not given the credit she deserved in her time. However, she was unapologetic about her work and passion for mycology, and so regardless of getting any recognition, she forged forwards.
“Anna Maria Hussey conjures this wonderful image of an eccentric woman with her basket and notebook strolling the fields and woods, collecting fungi, giving them a good sniff, and an occasional lick. It’s as delightful as it is romantic.”— Rose, Publisher
Book Features:
- Facsimile plates reproduced from Anna Maria Hussey’s Illustrations of British Mycology (1847–1855), with selected extracts from her original text.
- Detailed studies of native British fungi, co-illustrated with her sister Frances Reed.
- Period writings situating Hussey’s work in nineteenth-century mycology.
- The work of Anna Maria Hussey, often regarded as Britain’s first female mycologist.
- A distinctive gift and coffee table book for foragers, nature lovers, and admirers of mushroom art.
Table of Contents:
Contents:
- A Note on the Text
- Introduction
- The Mushroom by Emily Dickinson, 1847
- A Sketch of the History of Mycological Illustration by Louis Krieger, 1922
- Mushrooms and the Early History of Botany by Julius Sachs, 1875
- On Fairy-Rings by James Shirley Hibberd, 1862
- Toadstools and their Kindred by Eliza Ann Youmans, 1875
- On Collecting Funguses by Anna Maria Hussey, 1847
- List of Plates
- Bibliography & Further Reading
Editorial Reviews:
“Mycology has great charms. If any doubt, let them study Mrs. Hussey’s book.”—The Morning Post, 1851
Extract
Taken from the original 1847 work, Hussey’s detailed instructions for collecting, preserving, and staging her specimens provide a window into her methods of research in a domestic Victorian setting. In an era when fieldwork was becoming essential to the study of fungi, practical guidance such as this reflects her meticulous and resourceful spirit.
. . .
A basket is in the first place needful, and if the student should leave home without one, a profusion of lovely and rare objects will be certain to strew his path; in which case there are but two alternatives, to dissect on the spot, always an imperfect operation, or to carry away the spoil in hat or handkerchief, when on arrival at home, a heterogeneous mass of caps, stems, &c., presents itself—disjecta membra! who shall assign to each its proper parts? We have known a fishing-basket turned to excellent account when fish were shy, but the best of the osier-woven family is a plate-basket or knife-basket, unlined, it should be about a foot and a half long by a foot wide, and six inches deep, with a partition length-wise, the handle should be made to fold down for the facility of slipping under a carriage seat, and it is more convenient for use without a lid; any green leaves will screen the contents; stiff fern-leaves are best to prevent specimens from injuring each other; place in this basket two tools, for taking up by the roots from the earth, or severing from bark of trees, equally efficacious, a long strong broad-bladed butchers’ knife! start not, gentle reader, and a wrenching chisel! after much experience we find there is nothing too deep or too tight not to give way to these potent engines; the chisel should have an oval handle. Having cut deeply round the stem of an Agaric, Boletus, &c., at a sufficient distance to ensure the volva, if it have one, being uninjured, and you will find the knife cut easily through turf, insert the chisel, turn the ball of earth out, and deposit it erect and steady in the basket. Now we have filled the basket, where shall we put the tools? if walking, it is a puzzle, but a double leather-sheath with a loop, to carry reticule fashion, is a good plan, at any rate have a sheath because coat pockets can then receive them.
—Anna Maria Hussey, ‘On Collecting Funguses’, 1847
More About This Work
Anna Maria Hussey worked at a time when mycology, like botany before it, was one of the few sciences open to women. Yet even then they were kept to the sidelines, excluded from formal training and institutions that conferred scientific standing, and much of their work went uncredited. Hussey was among the earliest British women to make the study of fungi her own, bringing the native wild mushrooms to a general readership at a time when the field was still in its early days. She, alongside figures such as Mary Elizabeth Banning in America and Helen Beatrix Potter (now far better known for her children’s books than for her mycological research), made real contributions while working largely outside the profession. Hussey’s contributions, however, did not go completely unnoticed. The leading mycologist of the day, Rev. M. J. Berkeley, referenced her specimens in his work, and later named a genus, Husseia, in her honour.
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