The ah-zoo, original of the species

IN 1752, the Emperor Joseph II opened the royal menagerie to the citizens of Vienna.

The Paris Jardin des Plantes zoo was established 41 years later. Next, in 1828, came London Zoo. Dublin, the second city of the British Empire, joined the exclusive club on September 1, 1831, when the Zoological Society of Ireland opened its animal gardens in the Phoenix Park.

The political and social upheavals of the next 150 years would threaten the ‘ah-zoo’ with extinction but it survived to become one of Ireland’s best-loved institutions. A book being launched this evening tells the extraordinary story. Dublin Zoo: An Illustrated History is by Catherine de Courcy, a specialist in the history of zoos.