Add to ORKGThe German dominican and theologian Albertus Magnus ( † 1280 ) wrote many works, and composed by 1270 a treatise De animalibus which is capital for the history of the zoology. This work consists of 26 books, among which the 19 first ones form a kind of vast paraphrase of Aristoteles' zoological treatises; the 7 others, on the other hand, are rich in informations drawn from personal observations or by inquiries " in the field ", which do not exclude for all the use of auctoritates. Albertus gives in particular some original and precious informations on the whaling in the North Sea, which inform us both about the techniques used at that time and about the presence of this animal in these waters in the XIIIth century. As on occasion of direct ...