Cabinets of Curious Creatures Lord Walter Rothschild assembled
the largest—and weirdest—menagerie ever collected by one man By
Josie Glausiusz The Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum Tring,
Hertfordshire, U.K. Photograph by Peter Fraser One case in
Rothschild’s museum houses a ponderous mix of hoofed grazing
mammals, among them small, swamp-dwelling African bushbuck
(left, seated on shelf and floor), a large dark-brown fruit-
eating Indian nilgai (center, seated), a four-horned antelope
(center, standing), as well as bison and buffalo heads. Lionel
Walter Rothschild, scion of the famous banking family, was
exceedingly fond of zebras. In 1894 he harnessed three to a
carriage and drove them through the streets of London and on to
the forecourt of Buckingham Palace. He was also an exceptionally
keen ornithologist. In 1931, in order to pay off a debt to a
blackmailing peeress, he sold his collection of 280,000 bird
skins to the American Museum of Natural History in New York. He
also amassed a collection of 2.25 mi