Most everyone who is interested in dinosaurs has either seen images of or heard of the famous Crystal Palace Dinosaurs in England, but not as many are familiar with the "antediluvian monsters" reconstructed at Carl Hagenbeck's Zoological Park at Hamburg. I certainly had not, at least not until I just happened to be flipping through a copy of J.W. Gregory's 1915 book Geology of To-Day.
When I first saw the images, like the one of the Ceratosaurus nibbling a Stegosaurus above, I wasn't sure if I was looking at real photographs or some kind of illustration superimposed on photographs. Reflections of some super-spiky Triceratops in a pond in another image, however, suggested I was looking at real sculptures.
Unfortunately I don't have any further information about the sculptures. I do not know who made them or even if they can still be seen today, but if you know please speak up in the comments.
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They were made by sculptor Josef Pallenberg in 1909/10. Some of theme were destroyed in the bombing in World War 2, but most can still be seen today. More about them on this website (in German):
http://www.hagenbeck-tierpark.de/de/tierpark/park-und-kultur/dinosaurie…
They still can be seen at their original location at Tierpark Hagenbeck, which is one of Germany's biggest and most important zoological gardens.
They are painted in rather garish colours nowadays, but I have seen them in concrete grey back in the eighties.
BTW, in pre-WWI days Hagenbeck used a miniature railway, said to be the first of its kind, to transport visitors around his 'dinosaur park'.
Carl Hagenbeck, the founder of Tierpark Hagenbeck, actually believed, or at least hoped, that Dinosaurs were still alive in remote corners of Africa. He wrote about this in his autobiography Von Tieren und Menschen (Of Animals and Humans) in 1908. He also financed an expedition to search for the Mokele Mbembe, but the only monsters this expedition found were members of king (C)Leopolds Force Publique.
My reaction to the first picture was it was a drawing as well. I have seen the Triceratops sculptures in an older kids Dinosaur book before (can't remember which now sadly), but up till now I had no idea where these Triceratops were from. Cool is all I have to say.
Just from random searches of the net there seems to have been a major breakout of Dinosaur sculpture themed parks as of late. It'd be cool to set up a site or forum to catalouge them all (and what statues are out there).
I really like the waterbound Triceratops, though! He looks like he's enjoying a cool bath on a hot day.
Growing up, I had an old photograph of the triceratops in water from an outdated dinosaur book or magazine nearly identical to the one here. One of my all time favorite dinosaur images.
Me again. Out of curiousity I searched "Tierpark Hagenbeck," "Tierpark Hagenbeck dinosaur" and "Tierpark Hagenbeck triceratops" on flickr the results pulled up some current photographs of these scuplutures, for those interested in checking them out.
Thanks for the info on these, guys!
I've seen the old concept artwork (colour painting) for the triceratops exhibit in a book called 'Life Before Man' which was a volume from a Time-Life series. It belonged to my Dad (I remember it being a big deal to be allowed to look at it when I was a kiid). The series came out in the 1970's and was mostly on archaeology/palaeoanthropology.
It's been a while since I saw the book, I had assumed the artwork was a quick colour sketch by Charkles knight, but I might be wrong.
HEYY!!! Is this the book that some of you are remembering?
When I was a kid, I had -- in fact, I still have -- a book called Wonders of the Animal Kingdom. It covered both living and prehistoric animals. The illustrations inside were provided as stamps or stickers, and you had to put them in place above the brief description of each animal.
I found an image of the book online. SEE THIS IMAGE. As you can see, the illustration of Triceratops was definitely based on the sculpture above.
Although it's not included in the image I linked above, I also remember the book's illustration of Stegosaurus, and it too was definitely based on the sculpture above (although the biting Ceratosaurus was not included in the illustration).
What a weird nostalgic childhood flashback from out of the blue.