[7 Manuscript] - Appunti di Zootecnia - 1880-1920

Notes on Animal Science – Seven handwritten notebooks by Angelo Pongiluppi (early 20th century)

Rare and complete corpus of seven handwritten notebooks entitled Notes on Animal Science, signed by Angelo Pongiluppi.

Pocket-sized notebooks (about 16.5 x 10.2 cm), bound in original beige/cream paper or cardboard, with titles and numbering in ink on the cover (Vol. I–VII). Watermarked antique paper, black and blue ink, with numerous pen and color drawings (red and black).

Content
The notes constitute a true personal treatise on general and specialized animal science, written with great care and competence. The main themes include:
• Hybridization and crossbreeding of cattle breeds (e.g., Durham bull × Flemish breed, Alpine Black cow, Alpine Black bull), with detailed colorful genealogical trees showing the transmission of traits (coat red/black, atavism, reversions).
• Bilateral or alternating crossing schemes, reversal, breed purity and the formation of intermediate breeds, with generational diagrams (I–X).
• Morphological and physiological variations: gigantism, division-based variation, juxtaposition, fusion, acceleration (early maturity), delay, similar and related variations.
• High-quality pen drawings: skull of a calf born in Brazil, ram’s head with spiral horns, skeletons and anatomical details.
• Laws of variation according to Darwin, Lamarck, Goethe, Wolff, Spencer, Weismann; nature of inheritance, centrifugal and centripetal force of variations, sexual unit, sexual dimorphism (mammals and birds).
• Concrete examples of interspecific hybridization: mare × zebra, sow × boar, sheep × ram, etc.
• Detailed statistical data on the European animal population (horses, cattle, pigs, sheep, goats) by country (England, France, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Switzerland, Serbia, etc.) referring to years 1890–1906, with import/export tables and economic values.
• Notes on polymorphism, hermaphroditism, sexual morphological differences and genetic improvement practices.

The text is dense, tidy, with frequent schemes, tables and original drawings. These are study notes of a high level, probably university or a particularly educated technician/breeder, drafted at a pivotal moment in the history of animal genetics (shortly after Mendel’s laws were rediscovered and amid debates among Darwinism, Lamarckism and Weismann’s theories).

Importance and rarity
• Extreme rarity: complete set of seven original handwritten notebooks on animal science from the early 1900s. Documents of this kind (private notes rich with colorful genealogical diagrams and anatomical drawings) are extremely rare on the antiquarian market and nearly absent in public collections.

• Scientific and historical value: direct testimony of the transmission of evolutionary and genetic theories applied to breeding in Italy in the early years of the 20th century. The colorful family trees and crossing diagrams represent early and very clear examples of graphical representation of heredity.

• Collectors’ interest: ideal for libraries specialized in the history of agriculture, veterinary science and genetics, for collectors of scientific manuscripts and the history of animal husbandry.

Overall condition good: paper slightly yellowed with some marginal water stains, original bindings still firm, text and drawings fully legible and vivid.

Set of seven volumes in total.

Ideal for auctions of rare books, scientific manuscripts or the history of agriculture and veterinary medicine.