"Explores artistic depictions of the ostrich from ancient Egypt to the Renaissance works of Raphael. Traces the history of shifting interpretations given to the ostrich in scientific texts, literature, and religious writings"--Provided by publisher.
Introduction : Raphael's disputed legacy -- A brief history of the ostrich : antiquity and the Middle Ages -- The eagle and the ostrich : the court of Urbino -- Pope Leo X and Raphael's ostriches -- Raphael's heirs -- Farnese ostriches and Vasari's Raphael -- Fortune is an ostrich : discontent in the 1550s and 1560s -- Curiosity and the ostrich in the Counter-Reformation -- Taming the ostrich : Ripa and Aldrovandi.