It would be unlikely to go through much of school and not have heard of John James Audubon. He’s got an entire organization named after him . He was a naturalist and ornithologist who used his exceptional painting skills to create the foremost book about American birds.
Audubon was the primary authority on topics of nature and animals in his time. So it stands to reason that the things he had to say on the subject were accepted as factual without much verification.
But what if I told you that the man behind the book The Birds of America was guilty of completely of fabricating entire species of animals as a prank?
Constantine Samuel Rafinesque
To understand why he might be interested in spreading a lie, you have to start with Constantine Rafinesque .
Constantine was considered a genius in his time. He studied a bit of everything from botany to anthropology to linguistics. He was born near Constantinople and traveled around America.
At one point, he was looking to study the plants of America. He thought some of the plants seen in the backgrounds of Audubon’s paintings might have been new species. Who better to spend time with than the foremost authority on American Flora and Fauna?
Rafinesque was in for a bit of a surprise on that front.
It turns out that Rafinesque wasn’t the most likable person. His genius nature might have made him a bit standoffish or off-putting to people. According to writer John Jeremiah Sullivan , Audubon is the only person on record who actually like Rafinesque.
Perhaps it was friendly joking on his part, or perhaps there was an element of gullibility to Rafinesque, but whatever the reason, Audubon decided to play a joke on him by telling him about animal species that never actually existed.
And of course, because he’s such an authority on the subject, Rafinesque never even thought to question the fake information he was being given.
The species Audubon told him about can be seen below. They’re just plausible enough to not be immediately discredited, but they also each feature an attribute that doesn’t make sense.
