Uncommon copy of the "monthly journal" of the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin for August 1862, with the first notice of the Australian Little Red Flying Fox (Pteropus scapulatus Peters).

Uncommon copy of the "monthly journal" of the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin for August 1862, with the first notice of the Australian Little Red Flying Fox (Pteropus scapulatus Peters).

The Academy was founded in 1700 but was revolutionised by Frederick the Great, who helped establish it as one of the great centres for scientific research. Among the interesting and diverse articles printed here is one by H.W. Peters on the Little Red Flying Fox, the smallest of its species and endemic from Shark Bay in Western Australia right around the top of Australia, and down the east coast to Victoria. This article is the first scientific notice of the species, based on a specimen gathered by Peters personally in Cape York. Peters did extensive fieldwork on the Australian mainland, and any number of species are named after him.

Despite its Australian content, holdings of this journal in Australia are effectively non-existent.