Gould, N., 1999. Review of Rookmaaker, The Rhinoceros in Captivity. International Zoo News 46 (2): 100-101
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| Location: |
World |
| Subject: |
Captivity |
| Species: |
All Rhino Species |
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L.C. Rookmaaker is one of those dedicated researchers whose unpaid labours contribute so much to the sum of knowledge within the zoo community. Rhinoceroses and zoo history are two subjects each of which has its own devoted following, so by combining the two in one magnificent book, he deserves to achieve a wide readership (at least by the relatively modest standards of specialist zoological publications).
Any rhinoceros studbook keeper knows how difficult it is to keep track of even the living rhinos in captivity, so Mr Rookmaaker's aim – `to collect information about each individual rhinoceros which has been kept in captivity from the earliest times to the present' – was, as he admits in his introduction, `a quite impossible task'. Rhino enthusiasts will probably be kept busy for years to come trying to find records he missed! (That is, those rhino enthusiasts who had not already helped in the compilation of the book: Marvin Jones of San Diego, Heinz-Georg Klös of Berlin and Richard J. Reynolds III of Atlanta – whose articles in International Zoo Yearbook 2 and 4 were forerunners of the present work – receive special mention on the title page, but many others appear in the acknowledgements.) The number of rhinos documented is certainly impressive – 2,439 animals `from Roman times to 1994'. (The species breakdown is interesting – Indian, 397; Javan, 22; Sumatran, 96; black, 775; white, 1,105; unknown, 44.) Regular zoo visitors will enjoy checking up on animals they remember seeing in the past – I looked up my own earliest rhino acquaintance, Lorna, a D. bicornis who, as I now know, was at London Zoo from 1947 to 1964.
But The Rhinoceros in Captivity is much more than just a list. The book is a mouth-watering repository of zoological and zoological information of all sorts. In 1544 the Tartars besieged Peking with an army said to include 80,000 rhinos, but sadly the amazing picture this evokes – worthy of Cecil B. de Mille at his most expansive! – is overturned by a modern translator who has decided that yaks, not rhinos, were the animals involved. Bishop Heber noted in the 1820s that the Indian rhinos of the kings of Oudh at Lucknow `seem to propagate in captivity without reluctance', but did not enlarge on this tantalising comment; what did the kings of Oudh know that we don't? A rhino at Belle Vue Zoo, Manchester, in the mid-19th century had the run of the zoo, and frightened no one, but did annoy the laundry-maids by chewing the washing on the line. I could go on and on. . . The book also provides a valuable collection of rhino pictures – 166 in all, ranging from modern zoo photos to earlier depictions of great historical or artistic interest, including a Roman statuette unmistakably depicting a black rhino, and an early Chinese wine container in the form of a two-horned rhino of uncertain species.
One small regret, to end with – why does so confirmed a rhino-lover as Mr Rookmaaker regularly refer to any individual animal as `it', even when its sex is known? I realise that this usage is common when writing about animals, but it always irritates me (and, as some attentive readers may have noticed, I do my best to eliminate it from the pages of I.Z.N.). To apply the pronouns `he' and `she' to animals is not anthropomorphism, merely a recognition that they are living individuals rather than mere objects. But this is a very minor criticism: I'm sure the writer meant no disrespect, and probably few readers of his book will share my hypersensitivity on the subject! I am grateful to Mr Rookmaaker for a splendid tribute to a group of animals which have always been among my favourites. I hope his years of work, and the confidence of his publishers, will be rewarded with the sales the book deserves.
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Review of Rookmaaker, The Rhinoceros in Captivity
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