DELA NAŠIH ZAVODOV IN DRUŠTEV, 149-151
BREHM'S LIFE OF ANIMALS FROM 1872 IN POREČ, CROATIA
Brehm's Life of Animals is one of the most well-known books on zoology ever written. It was composed by Alfred Edmund Brehm in the 19th century. Brehm was born in 1829 in Unterrenthendorf and died in 1884 in Renthendorf (Germany). Because of his book, originally named Brehms Tierleben (Life of Animals), his name became a household word for popular zoological literature.
Due to his professional recognition in zoological circles, in 1860 he was commissioned to write a 10-volume zoological encyclopedia. The first six volumes of the encyclopedia appeared from 1864 to 1869, published by the Bibliographisches Institut under Herrmann Julius Meyer and illustrated under the direction of Robert Kretschmer. The second edition, which consisted of ten volumes, was published from 1876 to 1879. Charles Darwin reviewed some volumes of the encyclopedia. The second edition was reprinted from 1882 to 1884, and a third edition, published from 1890 to 1893, followed. The work has been translated into various languages. Immediately after the first edition was issued, the original publication was translated into Russian, French, Italian and Danish.
The Institute of Agriculture and Tourism library in Poreč holds a well preserved and complete sample of all six volumes of the original first edition in the Italian language published from 1869-1873. It is entitled La vita degli animali fLife of Animals), illustrated by Kretschmer and translated by Gaetano Branca and Stefano Travella. It is very likely the only copy of this edition in Croatia. The Institute is a successor to the research entity named Provincial Agriculture Institute founded in 1875 during the Austro-Hungarian period. The School, specialising in viticulture, enology and pomology, was founded 8 years later and its professors established a good library with the best natural sciences books available at that time. Many of these books are still in the Institute and
First page of the original first edition of the Brehm's book "La vita degli animali" (Life of Animals)
represent a great historical heritage. Brehm's Life of Animals is one of them.
Worldwide, many editions in several languages were published in the 19th and 20th centuries, some in the form of abridged, one-volume works.
According to OPAC SBN (Catalogo del servizio bib-liotecario nazionale) there are about 200 copies of this original Italian first edition published by Unione Tipo-grafico Editrice in Torino in different Italian libraries but not many of those are complete or as well preserved as the one in Poreč. In 1891 the second Italian edition was published by the same publishing house, followed by several copies in the period up to 1963 when the publisher Armando Curcio Editore in Rome published a new book entitled Vita degli animali. Several other editions were also published, i.e. from Editrice Italiana di cultura (Rome), Istituto Editoriale Moderno (Milano), European Book (Milano), Padova: C.D.E. followed, with the last from Rizzoli (Milano) in 1983.
In Croatia, so far seven editions have been published. The first Croatian edition, named originally Kako žive životinje (How Animals Live), was published in 1937 by Minerva publishing house in Zagreb and the second, with the same title, in 1966 by Otokar Keršovani in Rije-ka. In the same year, Brehmove najljepše priče (Brehm's Best Stories) was published in Zagreb followed two years later by the book entitled Egzotične ptice (Exotic Birds). The fifth edition Život životinja (Life of Animals) was issued in 1982 by the publishing house Prosvjeta and the second edition of the same book, in 1983 by Prosvjeta and Sveučilišna naklada Liber. The last edition was issued by the publishing house Orakul in Zagreb in 2002 under the same title, i.e. Life of Animals.
The first edition in Slovenian entitled Življenje živali fLife of Animals) was published in 1938 by Umetniška propaganda (three volumes in 1938 and one volume in 1940). In 1978 another edition under the name Velika knjiga o živali fThe Great Book of Animals^ was published by the Cankarjeva založba publishing house in Ljubljana. Two more editions of this book were published by the same publishing house in 1982 and 1986.
This book, published during Brehm's lifetime, and almost simultaneously with the German original, represents a valuable sample of this famous work and it is hoped that, in the near future, it will be properly preserved and restored, as well as made accessible to the public.
*Editorial information about Brehm's Life of Animals in Italy, Croatia and Slovenia was collected with the help of: Fogar Livio, 2014, Biblioteca del Museo Civico di Storia Naturale, Via Tominz, Trieste, Italy, Lopin Mirjam, 2014, Središnja informacijska služba, Nacionalna i sveučilišna knjižnica u Zagrebu, and Škerget Daniela 2014, Slovenska bibliografija, Narodna in univerzitetna knjižnica, Turjaška 1, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Barbara Sladonja