Richard Meinertzhagen—a case of fraud examined

Museum collections are rich repositories of information. The specimens and the data they bear continue to provide new insights into ornithology and biological processes decades or even centuries after they were collected. The benefits to be gained from museum collections depend implicitly upon the accuracy of the information associated with the specimens and the correct interpretation of those data (Parkes 1989, Knox & Walters 1992). Collectors and dealers have often been suspected of fabricating data for a variety of reasons, but proven cases have been documented only rarely (e.g. Nicholson & Ferguson-Lees 1962). This paper examines one such case.