Butterflies: Decoding Their Signs & Symbols - Rilegato

Howse, Philip

Rilegato

ISBN 10: 1554077737 ISBN 13: 9781554077731

Casa editrice: Firefly Books Ltd, 2010

Riassunto

A pioneering exploration of butterfly markings and how humans respond to them.

People have always marveled at the colors, patterns and designs on the wings of butterflies and moths, but there has been little attempt to decode them or to recognize any great significance in them.

In Butterflies: Decoding Their Signs & Symbols Philip Howse explains how these markings protect butterflies and moths from their principal predators, including birds, lizards and monkeys. These insectivores, he argues, detect their prey by perceiving small details of shape and color rather than the "whole picture" of the insect. These details can create an illusion that camouflages the butterfly or threatens its predator.

If humans look at the detail on a butterfly in the way that a bird sees it, surprising images reveal themselves: owls' eyes, snakes' heads, caterpillars, lizards, wasps, scorpions, birds' beaks, feathers. Howse explores how these signs and symbols, so important in the animal world, became archetypal symbols in our world. Photographs and illustrations chronicle how butterflies and their markings have appeared throughout history, whether on cave walls and in modern art or in our most important mythologies, where they were transformed into the Mother Goddesses by the ancient Greeks, the ancient Egyptians and the Aztecs.

Butterflies: Decoding Their Signs & Symbols is a fascinating illustrated study of butterflies, but it also poses provocative questions and offers conclusions that will leave readers with a new view of the natural world and how they perceive it. Naturalists and lepidopterists will find it of particular interest.

Su questo libro

Informazioni sull?autore

Philip Howse is a retired professor from Southampton, England, and the author of professional books and research articles on insect behavior and ecology. He has also developed award-winning environmentally friendly methods of insect control.

Dettagli dell'edizione

• Editore: Firefly Books Ltd
• Data di pubblicazione: 2010
• Lingua: Inglese
• ISBN 10: 1554077737
• ISBN 13: 9781554077731
• Rilegatura: Copertina rigida
• Numero di pagine: 192
• Contatto del produttore: non disponibile
• Persona responsabile: Nachyta Pederzini; 0039 0516047011; n.pederzini@terminaldistribuzione.com; ; Via Bruno Buozzi, 24/26,; Granarolo dell'Emilia BO,; 40057; Italia