Our objective is to provide free access for all scientists to the old zoological literature, particularly to those important publications where name-bearing zoological taxa were originally described. The literature is digitized in image format by the SUB Göttingen (our university library). In a first 2-year period (2003-2005) financed by the DFG we have digitized nearly all taxonomically relevant zoological literature from the beginnings until 1770 (about 400 works). Only some 5 % of the literature is not present in Göttingen and we are currently trying to obtain some works from other libraries. In a second 2-year-period we will try to cover the period from 1770 to 1800. Monographic works and journal articles shall both be digitized. The AnimalBase database is primarily established to link the old literature with the names of the animals described therein. We have continuously gone through the old works, from 1757 onwards, and entered all correctly described new animal names (genera and species taxa) by hand according to a standard established by our working group. (...) AnimalBase is a service provided by the University of Göttingen, Germany. Our work is funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG. This page is under construction and we apologize for things not yet working perfectly. ... [Information of the supplier, modified]
Although these literature searches were originally conceived as providing working documents for our own researches, it soon became apparent that this comprehensive catalogue of literature and illustrations should be made generally available rapidly and freely as a working tool for all those interested in working on Trichoptera material from Africa, especially for colleagues in far-distant institutes and without access to large libraries. Each page will record the name of the species, its distribution, the best illustrations of its diagnostic characters available in the literature, usually of genital structures, and the appropriate original literature. This bibliographic reference work containing over 1200 species and subspecies in 26 families and 109 genera makes no claim to be complete. The clarification of problematic systematic questions or synonyms was also not one of its aims. ... [Information of the supplier]
