#603 Paris: comparative anatomy museum at the Jardin des Plantes

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The comparative anatomy museum in Paris - Galerie de Paleontologie
et d'Anatomie Comparee - consists of two floors in an enormous building in the Jardin de Plantes, and is unlike any natural history museum

 I've ever visited . . . I could spend weeks there and I will return.

I've never been so overwhelmed entering a room . . . there were hundreds of skeletons identified by hand-written cards from the 1800s.  There were skeletons everywhere in the huge atrium . . .  a dizzying array of skeletons of every shape and size.   The academic ambiance was perfect for a figurative sculptor and collector of bones
and skeletons such as myself.  Osteology has long been
an interest and passion . . . I was in heaven!

Every imaginable species could be seen . . . including dinosaurs.  Glass cases and cabinets
filled with an astonishing array of bird skeletons and more.  I took hundreds of pictures and made
many sketches with notes.  Only a few students were there on the day we attended and as the image
shows below, I was able to sit on the floor and get great photographic angles of the specimens.

The collections derive from the great expeditions of naturalists of the 18th and 19th centuries as well as specimens

 from the zoo (menagerie) on the grounds of the Jardin des Plantes which we had visited the day before. 

 Barye, Bugatti, and Fremiet had worked in not only the zoo, but in the vast room we were standing in.

 I'm concluding every blog about our trip to Paris last month with a glimpse of life in the beautiful city.

The first photo depicts Sacre Coure on the bluff of Montmarte, looking north from the Musee d'Orsay on a rainy day.
We stayed in Montmarte . . . our hotel room overlooked Sacre Coure and the next photo, shows the view from our room.
 Our mornings started with coffee, croissant, and fruit in the room . . . the day's adventure before us.

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Blog, text, photos, drawings, and sculpture . . . © Sandy Scott and Trish