The notebooks of Charles Gould (1834–1893) reveal that he was a talented artist. He was a son of the famous ornithologist, John Gould and his wife, Eliza (Coxen), who illustrated many of her husband’s books. After finishing his education, Charles Gould was employed by the British Geological Survey, where he worked for almost two years. On the recommendation of Sir Roderick Murchison, he was appointed in 1859 as the first geological surveyor of Tasmania.
Gould’s notebooks contain geological observations, as may be expected, such as measured sections through coal measure sequences and rough cross sections through mountain ranges. The accurately deduced juxtaposition of various rock types, whether by faulting or intrusion is shown in a number of diagrams.
The notebooks contain numerous sketches of scenery, some from places he saw on his voyage to Australia and others from his time as a geological surveyor in Tasmania. Recording the layout of the land from a high vantage point assisted Gould in the preparation of his geological maps.
A lighter, more whimsical side to Gould’s nature can be glimpsed by other scribbling in his notebooks, where he has drawn rough portraits of people, animals and everyday objects.

The South African geologist Alexander Logie du Toit (1878-1948) started his geological career in 1903 with the Geological Commission of the Cape of Good Hope, where he mapped Palaeozoic and Mesozoic rocks of the Cape and Karoo Basins. In September 1914 he made a comparative study of Palaeozoic and Mesozoic rocks in South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, and Tasmania. He was particularly interested in “Cambrian” (now Neoproterozoic) and Carboniferous glacial beds, and Permian fossiliferous coal measures in Australia, which correlated with similar beds in South Africa. The glacial beds and Glossopterid plant fossils were some of the crucial evidences for the “Gondwana” biogeographic province of Suess. Du Toit studied all the famous localities of glacial tillites in Australia, including the “Cambrian” (Neoproterozoic) Sturt River tillites near Adelaide, South Australia, the Hallet Cove tillites (South Australia) of Carboniferous age, the Carboniferous Bacchus Marsh tillites NW of Melbourne (Victoria), and the Wynyard tillites of northern Tasmania (now known to be Neoproterozoic). Du Toit made meticulous observations at all the tillite localities he studied, illustrated with sketch maps, cross sections and detailed drawings in his Australian Notebook. None of his observations were published, although they included the first recognition of erratic clasts of the Sturtian tillite within the younger Hallet Cove tillite, and of synglacial deformation at Bacchus Marsh. Du Toit made collections of the various tillites, and also of the Glossopterid fossil floras from Australia, and brought them back to South Africa, where they are still preserved in Cape Town.

This paper illustrates how a visual culture related to mining and extractive activities develops during the 19th century, from technical drawings in notebooks to paintings and journals’ illustration.
The main case-study and starting point is a notebook of the mining engineer Frédéric Le Play (1806-1882), also known as the commissioner general of the Parisian great exhibition in 1867. The notebook retraces a 6-months travel in northern Germany in 1829, especially in the Harz region, one of the most important mining districts in Europe (especially for silver, copper, lead and zinc). The notebook is filled with sketches of machines, buildings, work tools, etc.
By re-situating this case-study in the context of the time, the paper shows how such sketches are “translated” into more articulated images, featuring aesthetic characteristics, that were largely diffused on books and periodical journals of scientific dissemination in the second half of the century.
These images, especially those related to the miners’ working conditions, also demonstrate the influence of the contemporary painting movement related to social realism.
As a conclusion and opening to further research, it is possible to draw a comparison between this “western” iconography and a painted hand-scroll (1820s-1840s) representing the activity of the Sado gold and silver mine in Japan. A copy of this hand-scroll is conserved in the École des Mines library (Paris) together with Le Play’s notebook, showing thus how this renewed visual culture is shared by different iconographic traditions, and their overlapping.

In 18th – 19th centuries, it was very common for travelers – naturalists to write detailed travel logs in which they were describing all aspects of their travels, often including rock and mineral they saw, or fossils they found. Prime example of this might be Charles Darwin and his journal of the voyage on HMS Beagle in 1831-1836, that was then used as a key reference point for his theory of evolution. Probably one of the most extensive records of similar nature are “Notaty” (“Notes”) by Ludwik Zejszner (1805-1871). Zejszner was an outstanding Polish geologist, paleontologist and geological cartographer. His scientific output includes over 300 treatises and articles published in Polish, German, Austrian, French, Russian, Czech and Hungarian periodicals. Most of his publications were based on his own field studies. Zejszner’s field notebooks, bound in 11 volumes, span years 1824 – 1870. i.e. almost his entire professional career; only notes from years 1825, early 1826, 1836 and 1848 are missing. He covered his trips abroad, purchases for his personal scientific library, his correspondence, and – above all – his geological field studies. His field observations on surface structure of studied regions, on stratigraphy etc. were often supplemented by sketches of particular outcrops; he also described his field equipment, methodology of his field work, and laboratory work. Zejszner’s “Notaty” illustrate evolution of his ideas from simple geological models based mostly on Werner paradigms to mature modern understanding of geology and stratigraphy, often including also thoughts on various deposits of economic importance.