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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 12m

Ugh! Luckily King's still supports 12 month RF applications, with replacement for the whole period

Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 16m

Yes, currently have a Leverhulme Research Fellowship (so 1 year teaching replacement plus some expenses)

No success with AHRC though, and I only know one person who won an award under the new schemes....

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 22h

I don't think it's possible! The finances in the last AHRC app I put together were only workable because we put the PI and Co-I (someone else and me) on very low fractional buyouts. This allowed budgeting for 2 full-time postdocs, but without much room for anything else.

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Crystal Palace Dinos @cpdinosaurs.bsky.social · 23h

A very good morning from this unimpressed glyptodon model - which was to be one of twelve real scale sculptures in Ciutadella Park, Barcelona.

Only a mammoth was completed before the project ended in 1910

(All the models are here:
mdc.csuc.cat/digital/coll...)

black and white photo. Close-up of a model glyptodon head. it has quite the facial expression

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Alison Laurence @dinostalgia.bsky.social · 1d

A call for 🦕🦖🦣 contributors! With Victor Monnin, I'm editing a collection about extinct animal parks—it's a field guide, of sorts, that turns a critical eye on places real, imagined, and yet to be. Find the full CFP for LANDS OF THE LOST here: tinyurl.com/dinoparks #PaleoSky #HistSci #EnvHist #STS

A promotional image for an edited collection called "Lands of the Lost: A Field Guide to Dinosaur Parks Physical, Fictional, and for the Future." The collection editors Dr. Victor Monnin & Dr. Alison Laurence are putting out a call for contributions. Abstracts are due January 10, 2026 to dinoparkfieldguide@gmail.com. Find the full call at: https://tinyurl.com/dinoparks

The background image is of the outdated-but-adored Iguanodon models at Crystal Palace Park.

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 1d

The series has been reconstructed here, from catalogues and surviving examples in natural history collections, with the possible sources of artistic inspiration

Lots of mammals, and the reptiles are an interesting mix of Crystal Palace-esque creatures and more typical late-19C reconstructions:

Illustrations of models of - Mammoth, woolly rhino, Megaloceros, Dinoceras, Mastodon, Sivatherium, Dinotherium, Anoplotherium, Ancitherium and Megalosaurus

Illustrations of models of : Iguanodon, Hylaeosaurus, Brontosaurus, Ichthyosaurus, Plesiosaurus, Pterodactylus, Rhamphorhynchus, Archaeopteryx, Mastodonsaurus and Nicrosaurus

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 1d

Cool new article investigating two paper mâché models from the Pfalzmuseum für Naturkunde, revealing a series of prehistoric animal reconstructions made in the 1890s: www.researchgate.net/publication/...

Just look at the Dinoceras!!!!

(thanks to @hydrarchos.bsky.social for sending this over)

A coloured photograph showing a model Dinoceras from five different angles. The creature is grey and elephant-like in body, but its head is truly extraordinary and almost indescribable. It is a bit like a rhino in form, but has two large down-facing sabre-teeth, four horns on its nose, flappy ears and two giant protuberances on its forehead, looking a bit like Mickey Mouse ears, but more upright. It is standing on a wooden stand, and has quizzical look, as if it querying why it is being observed.

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Richard Fallon @richardfallon.bsky.social · 6d

A literary Iguanodon at the Earth Sciences Library. Do any other libraries have dinosaurs or other antediluvian creatures carved into the furniture?

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 5d

There is Quenstedt's magnificent desk with ammonite carvings in the Tübingen palaeontological collections:

A photograph of a scene in a library - a wooden desk, with carved ammonites and a very uncomfortable looking wooden chair are in the foreground. A microscope and book are on the desk. In the background is a bookshelf with a large number of old books, a card index cabinet, and a wallchart with a picture of a Pareiasaurus skull. There is also a white plaster bust of Friedrich August von Quenstedt behind the desk.

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drewtoothpaste @drewtoothpaste.bsky.social · 13d

sound on

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Sarah Primate @langurlover.bsky.social · 17d

👀

Mystery creature found in 'forbidden cloud forest' of Peru is new species of marsupial

The newly described mouse opossum was discovered at a surprisingly high altitude in the Andes.

www.livescience.com

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 18d

A sadly never-realized Pleistocene animal park in La Plata, Argentina. Article from from Fray Mocho (9 August 1912)

The animals were designed by Josef Pallenberg, who also did the dinosaur sculptures at Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg

(more info in this article: doi.org/10.31048/185... )

#FossilFriday

Double page spread from an Argentinian magazine from 1912. Shows models of prehistoric animals, including a Toxodon, Macrauchenia, Mylodon, Megatherium, Mastodon, Glyptodon and sabre-toothed cap. The central image is an illustration of all the creatures standing in a landscape.

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Fenneke Sysling @fsysling.bsky.social · 18d

The news in English: www.government.nl/latest/news/....

The Netherlands will return Dubois collection to Indonesia

The Netherlands plans to transfer more than 28,000 fossils from the Dubois collection to Indonesia, following a request by Indonesian authorities. Today, Gouke Moes, Minister of Education, Culture and...

www.government.nl

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 18d

Breaking news: Netherlands to return the Dubois collection of fossils to Indonesia

Naturalis Biodiversity Center @naturalis.bsky.social · 18d

Nederland geeft fossielen Dubois-collectie terug aan Indonesië.

Statement en meer informatie te vinden op www.naturalis.nl/persberichte...

Scheldepkapje in Dubois-collectie in zaal vroege mens

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 20d

Great thread on the Field Museum's mid-90s palaeontology galleries, which look amazingly bonkers

Ben Miller @extinctmonsters.bsky.social · 21d

I was asked yesterday to post a walkthrough of Life Over Time, the shortest-lived and generally weirdest iteration of the Field Museum’s fossil halls. If you visited between 1994 and 2004, this is the version you saw. I’ve got some time, so let’s do this.

A carnival-like exhibit entrance with a dinosaur skull, coelacanth model, and pantodont skeleton in cases under freak show-style banners labeling them as "Mesozoic terror" and "the fish that wouldn't die'

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · 22d

We have two jobs at KCL History!

16-month post in Modern Irish and/or British History: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DOU178/l...

And 5-year post in Early Modern Europe & The World: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DOU182/l...

(both to start in January 2026)

Lecturer in Irish/British History at King's College London

Looking for a new job opportunity in academia? Check out this job opening for a Lecturer in Irish/British History on jobs.ac.uk!

www.jobs.ac.uk

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Dr Alex Bond @thelabandfield.bsky.social · Sep 12

Hey you. Wanna apply for a fellowship on collections? the AHRC Early career fellowships in cultural & heritage institutions are open!

The Natural History Museum priorities are below.

If you wanna talk birds, hit me up. Collectors, colonialism, Canada, Australia & more

www.ukri.org/opportunity/...

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 12

Good point! I'd be a bit more forgiving in this case too if the F. John Moa image wasn't so comically ridiculous by the standards of the time it was produced in...

Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 12

Ugh

Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 12

Also seems like a good earner for Getty Images. £275 for the medium res version of that!

www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/illustration/moa-extinct-giant-bird-in-new-zealand-royalty-free-illustration/1409766603

(I'm sure you could license some more plausible modern palaeoart for less...)

Moa - xtinct giant bird in New Zealand. In the background a Canary...

Moa - xtinct giant bird in New Zealand. In the background a Canary dragon tree . Chromolithograph after a drawing by F. John, published in 1900.

www.gettyimages.co.uk

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 12

Yeah, was struck by that when I saw the article - the choice of using F. John's Turkey-Moa was bizarre....

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 12

For #FossilFriday - advert for Kühnscherf Museum Cabinets, for when you need a display case for your indeterminate fossil reptile in early Weimar Germany

From Natur und Museum (1920)

Page of an advertisement from a German journal from 1920. In the middle is a picture of a portly black-clad man with a large white beard, black hat and walking cane, pointing at a glass case with a fossil reptile skeleton inside, and the words Kühnscherf at the base.

The main text reads "Kühnscherf Museums-Schränke, aus Eisen and Glas … Anerkannt die besten Museums-Schränke der Welt"
(translation --- "Kühnscherf Museum Cabinets, made from iron and glass … Recognized as the best museum cabinets in the world.")

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 10

Hugely looking forward to this, and enamoured of the sloths already

Darren Naish @tetzoo.bsky.social · Sep 10

Prehistoric Planet Ice Age out later this year... such a thrill to put this series together, oh my goodness are you in for a treat :) Hopefully news on events and publicity coming soon! Sloths, cats, rhinos, glyptodonts AND SOOOO MUCH MORE!!

Prehistoric Planet Ice Age homotheres, white and touching faces together.

Prehistoric Planet Ice Age Woolly rhino old adult and youngster.

Prehistoric Planet Ice Age Glyptotherium.

Prehistoric Planet Ice Age sloth mother with juvenile on back.

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 9

(main source of all this is Buxton Museum, which has a great archive for Dawkins and Jackson)

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Chris Manias @chrismanias.bsky.social · Sep 9

Yes, checked back and the ones I have most records of are mainly university extension or local lectures, or delivered via the Museum. His Geology & Palaeontology course at Owens College (in the 1870s) seems to end with a discussion of human prehistory too

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