Cabinet of curiosities
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Cabinets of curiosities, also known as wonder-rooms, were encyclopedic collections of objects whose categorical boundaries were, in Renaissance Europe, yet to be defined. Although more rudimentary col
"Musei Wormiani Historia", the frontispiece from the Museum Wormianum depicting Ole Worm's cabinet of curiosities
A male Narwhal, whose tusk, as a unicorn horn, was a common piece in cabinets
A corner of a cabinet, painted by Frans II Francken in 1636, reveals the range of connoisseurship of a Baroque-era virtuoso.
Fold-out engraving from Ferrante Imperato's Dell'Historia Naturale (Naples 1599), the earliest illustration of a natural history cabinet
Freak show
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A freak show is an exhibition of biological rarities, referred to in popular culture as "freaks of nature". Typical features would be physically unusual humans, such as those uncommonly large or small
Cabinet of curiosities
…collections, the bizarre or freakish biological specimens, whether genuine or fake, and the more exotic historical objects, could find a home in commercial freak shows and sideshows. In 1671, when visiting Thomas Browne (1605–1682), the courtier John Evelyn remarked…
Congress of Freaks at Ringling Brothers, 1924
A freak show in Rutland, Vermont in 1941
Coney Island and its popular ongoing freak show in August 2008.
P.T. Barnum's Own and Only Greatest Show on Earth appearing in Ithaca, New York on July 4, 1878