AUDUBON, edn•bon, Jon JAM ES (1780 1851). An American naturalist. He was horn at Mandeville, in Louisiana, then a Spanish col ony, on May 5, 1780. and died January 27, 1851. This date of his birth. however, is merely a tra dition; and probably he was born some years before that. His father was a wealthy French naval officer, who owned estates in Santo Do mingo: his mother, a Spanish creole. His child hood and youth were spent in France, where he was educated, and where be was given instruction in drawing by the painter DaVid. In 1798 he came to America and settled on a farm on the Perkiomen River, near Philadelphia. His father had acquired the property during the Revolutionary War, and now gave it to him. Here he lived ten years, collecting and sketching birds, and applying himself otherwise merely to field sports and social enjoyment. In 180S he married Lucy Bakewell, the daughter of a neigh bor, an Englishman, and at once migrated to the West. After passing ten years in a vain effort to establish himself in business in Kentucky and Louisiana, and finally losing all his property, he was reduced to supporting himself by draw ing portraits, and even teaching dancing and fencing. This came about from his persistent inattention to business, which was constantly neglected. as he acknowledges in his autobio graphic memoranda, for the sake of pursuing his studies and drawings in natural hist m.y. or merely for the pleasures of hunthw, fishing, and wandering in the woods. No deepening of his difficulties could cure him of his heedlessness, or cause him to forego any opportunity to add to his knowledge or series of drawings of birds.
In 1824 his projects were forwarded by a visit to Philadelphia, where he first became known to the intellectual society of the country and his abilities were recognized. Two years more of painting, teaching, and study, aided by his wife, enabled him to go to England to try to enrry out his long-cherished plan of publishing his draw ings of birds in a complete series of life-sized colored figures. He interested a sufficient number of subscribers to enable him to begin in Lon don, in 1S27, the publication in folio parts, at two guineas each, of his Birds of America, which excelled anything of the sort then extant. About five were then issued annually until its comple tion, in 1838, in 87 parts, containing 435 plates, giving 1065 figures. A complete good copy (of which about 175 sets are supposed to be in exist enee, 80 of which are in America) is now worth about $2000. No reading matter accompanied these plates, but this was prepared later, and published in Edinburgh, from 1831 to 1839, in five successive Vol IBM's, entitled Ornithological Biography, the technical part of which was pre pared by William .110ti1livray. Several editions and reprints, with reduced drawings, were made subsequently, of which the most important was the octavo edition of 1544, entitled Birds of America. A complete account of these combined
works, and of all Audubon's other ornithological writings, is given in the appendix to Elliott COUPses Birds of the Colorado l'allry (Washing ton. 1898). The years from 1830 to 1842 were spent in almost incessant travel in all accessible parts of the United States and Canada in search of new materials, or else in Europe, attending to the publication and sale of his great work. In 1842. however, Audubon purchased an estate on the bank of the Hudson River, now included within the city of New York. where a beautiful home was established for himself and his SOBS, Victor and John Woodhouse, and their families. In 1843. Audubon made a fruitful journey to the upper Missouri River region. the results of which were included in the first octavo edition of his Birds of America (1844). Thenceforth lie de voted his energies mainly to the preparation of a standard work on American mammals, for which his sons not only collected much material, hut for which John drew half of the colored plates; while John Baehman contributed tech nical and other parts. It was published in New York as Audubon and Bachman's Quadrupeds of North America, the first volume dated 1840 and the last 1353-54.
Audubon failed rapidly after 1847, gradually lost the use of his mind, died in 1851, and was latgied in Trinity Cemetery. New York. close to his home woods, which now fonts a beautiful dis trict called Audubon Park. As a man he was endowed with a hardy and most attractive frame, a most winning disposition, and a brilliant, poetic mind, animated by untiring enthusiasm. He was not learned in science, nor an artist in any broad sense of the term : but his work has been a source of immense pleasure and inspira tion.
The best and fullest biography of him is by his granddaughter. Maria. R. Audubon, entitled .ludubon and His Journals, with zoological and other notes by Elliott Cones (2 vols.. New York, 1:07). A previous Life of John James Audubon, the Naturalist (Ne• York. 1869) was written by another relative, Lucy AinInhon. Still earlier is DueItalian's Life and Adventures of ,I• .1. Andubon (2d ed., New York, 1804), which con tained many errors and was not approved by his family.
AUE, glee. HARTMANN YON (c.1170-1210). A German minnesinger. lie was the retainer of a Swabian knight, and is said to have had an exceptional education for a layman. lie took part in the crusade of 1190. and is celebrated in the Tristan and !•oble of Gottfried von Strass burg and in the Krone by Tiirlin. His earliest poem seems to have been Ever (about 1190). Among his other productions are: Oregorius coin &eine; Der orate Heinrich (his most popular work) ; Iieein, oder der Bitter snit dens Libeen.