Shooting Times & Country Magazine
The stuff of dreams
The Victorians took the stuffed sporting prize to a new level and now it is enjoying a resurgence, says Diggory Hadoke
Tasteless trophy or homage to a quarry well remembered? Taxidermy, coined from the Greek taxis (arrangement) and derma (skin) by Louis Dufresne in Paris in 1803, was once dismissed as archaic, but is now finding its way back into chic homes and sporting hotels.
A good trophy serves as a timeless aide-mémoire, helping sportsmen tap into that bank of reminiscences and emotions we keep locked in reserve, to be recalled in quiet moments.
It can also add atmosphere and style to any room, making it feel more fit for purpose — especially a room through which hunting, fishing or shooting people pass. What safari lodge is complete without a zebra skin on the floor? If you want the look, start at £250 for a slightly worn one.
Vintage catch
A fishing lodge with a titanic, pastcaught monster pike or salmon in a case will be all the better able to heighten the anticipation of today’s guests before they go in search of their own specimen in the morning. A vintage example should be easy to find for around £500.
To many hunters, the otherwise useless and inedible remains of their endeavour – the horns and hide of the quarry – when crafted into a sculptural, naturalistic representation of the living animal, help to bring back the joys and frustrations of the hunt, however long ago it may have taken place.
Some men hang only mounts accounted for by their own hand, yet what of yesterday’s proud trophies? Are they best left to gather dust, dismissed as belonging to a dead generation? I think not. Finding a place for the spoils of long-forgotten
friends assume it is fake, so she hasn’t yet been set on fire.
If the old-school look is what you want, provincial auctions offer a wonderful range of evocative, and provocative, historic display pieces. How about an otter mask for the boot room? I found three for sale in
“The horns and hide of the quarry bring back the joys and frustrations of the hunt”
a provincial auction, which sold for around £100 each.
Adding some old-world charm to a study can be accomplished with some well-chosen mounts. If you can afford a tiger or leopard, they are the most impactful, providing a touch of the old Raj to the leather Chesterfields and mahogany book cases.
They don’t come cheap, however. Tiger mounts are rare, rarer still in good condition, and there are no more coming on to the market. Expect to pay upwards of £4,000 for a head and shoulders mount by one of the famous taxidermists such as Van Ingen of Mysore. Examples of vintage specimens like this, now no longer available to hunters, could be good investments, if you take care of them.
Taxidermy isn’t only for an old country-house look. Contrast a modern, dark-wood floor, white walls, clean lines and simple furniture with a dramatic buffalo skull mount, with its stark white bone and black horn, as a centrepiece above the fireplace, or perhaps a well-done modern mount of a lechwe or even a roebuck, if space is more limited. A set of buffalo horns on a skull mount should be yours for £300 in the right sale.
The use of taxidermy as a decorative statement and as a means by which to imbue a room with character is ancient. The walls of Blair Atholl have been lined with the skull mounts of red stags taken on the hill for generations. I noted one dated 1813 when I last visited. They attest to the sustainability of hill stalking as a strategy for maintaining healthy herds of deer for centuries.
It took root in wider British culture with the expansion of the Empire from the late 1700s until the end of World War II. The hunting or gathering of exotic specimens occurred for recreational and scientific purposes.
Unknown territories
The Victorian amateur naturalist was once a common sight in farflung jungles and deserts, finding, preserving and recording new species and varieties of fauna, as the colonies expanded deeper into hitherto unknown territories.
It must have been a very exciting time to be involved in British zoological circles when new creatures were being brought back almost on a daily basis to the wonder of the
scientific community and London society. When a newly discovered duck-billed platypus was stuffed and sent back to Britain, at first it was thought to be a joke.
Alongside the naturalists strode the hunters, who sought adventure and the thrill of the chase, engaging dangerous animals on their own ground, using whatever firearms London or Birmingham could produce to make the task possible. They often amassed large private collections, such as that seen at the museum at Quex Park in Kent, which still allows visitors to marvel at this window into a different age.
One Victorian fashion was for anthropomorphic scenes of animals, perhaps mice playing billiards or squirrels dressed for dinner. The most famous purveyor of this style was Walter Potter. Whatever your taste, as the Victorian era progressed, so did the accuracy and naturalistic nature of taxidermy.
Carl Akeley excelled in this respect with his 1909 African dioramas for the American Museum of Natural History, including full mounts of adult elephants. He demonstrated the possibilities for dramatic realism that US taxidermists continue to this day. Perhaps the best, most lifelike works ever undertaken are to be seen at US shows such as Safari Club International and Dallas Safari Club.
Dramatic poses
In England, Peter Spicer became the Victorian era’s taxidermy equivalent of the painters Archibald Thorburn and Thomas Blinks. Spicer pioneered the naturalistic diorama of animals in dramatic poses or action scenes, often with realistic painted backgrounds, all enclosed in a glass case or dome.
In India, Van Ingen of Mysore made tiger and leopard rugs and mounts increasingly fierce and realistic, with snarling faces and glass eyes to add to the realism. Today, these masters are at the top of the list for collectors. Theobald Bros and Rowland Ward are also names to look out for.
Modern taxidermy is often superb, with accurate casts of most animals available for the stretching of the skin, producing anatomically correct and lifelike poses. They can be bought very reasonably — £200 or £300 will buy a kudu or impala shoulder mount that would have cost the original commissioner of the trophy 10 times that, at least.
So when looking for that dramatic piece, evocative of times past, to furnish your room, look at provincial auction rooms for specimens or trophies from yesteryear.
“Akeley showed the possibilities for dramatic realism”