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The nineteenth century undersea. The visualizing of the underwater world in art and science

Around 1800, the world undersea was still virtually unknown; one century later the enormous diversity of life in depth turned out to be richer than anyone had ever thought possible. During the nineteenth century, the underwater world was discovered and visualized for the first time. How deep were the seas and the oceans and what did the seabed look like? The unknown life in the deep fascinated researchers, artists and entrepreneurs. The mariner Matthew Maury was the first to visualize the bottom of the ocean, published in special maps from 1852 onwards. Maury’s new maps inspired the American entrepreneur Cyrus Field to construct telegraph cables across the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean to connect Europe and the United States. The direct communication caused a sensation on both sides of the Atlantic. The construction of telegraph cables created an important impulse in the research of the underwater world. What kind of life lived at what depth in sea and the ocean? The various deep-sea expeditions provided a stream of new species and insights about the depths of the seas and oceans. This new discovered underwater world also captured the imagination of a variety of artists. Edward Moran, Ilja Repin, Eugen Ransonnet-Villez and Willem Dijsselhof each depicted the underwater world in their own artistic way. In the meantime the underwater world also caused a sensation among the general public. People, young and old, dreamed away in front of an aquarium, in the zoo or just at home. This article presents an outline of the way the undersea captured the imagination of scientists, artists and the general public in the nineteenth century.