Contribution | Notable Findings:

He wrote "Origines sive Etymologiae", a compendium on animals that served until the rediscovery of Aristotle and Pliny. Full of errors, it nevertheless was influential for hundreds of years. He also wrote "De Natura Rerum".

Contribution | Notable Findings:

He provided information on Asiatic fauna, revealing new animals to Europeans.

Contribution | Notable Findings:

He wrote "De Animalibus". He promoted Aristotle but also included new material on the perfection and intelligence of animals, especially bees.

Contribution | Notable Findings:

New animals soon begin to overload European zoology. Columbus is said to have introduced cattle, horses, and eight pigs from the Canary Islands to Hispanhola in 1493, giving rise to virtual devastation of that and other islands. Pigs were often set ashore by sailors to provide food on the ship's later return. Feral populations of hogs were often dangerous to humans.

Contribution | Notable Findings:

Wrote "Sumario de la Natural Historia delas Indias" (Toledo, 1527). He was the first to describe many New World animals, such as the tapir, opossum, manatee, iguana, armadillo, ant-eaters, sloth, pelican, humming birds, etc. Bartolemeu de las Casas said the book contained "almost as many lies as pages."

Contribution | Notable Findings:

A german abbess who warned in Physica and said "just as dangerous winds come forth with lightning and thunder and hail, the toad has some diabolical art in it." This was the time when medieval bestiaries grouped amphibians with reptiles and toads were seen to be dangerous.

Notable Findings/ Events:

Prisoners tried to poison their guards by taking a toad and mixed its poison with the drink. Turned out, the prisoners were the ones to drink it, only one survived but eventually suffered for seven years from a "monstrous swelling".

Notable Findings/ Events:

Toads are dangerously venomous and they have a habit of stalking their victims. Toads of Cemais, now in Pembrokshire, once stalked and devoured a young man from the neighborhood.