Gerrit Wartenaar

[1] In 1772, Gerrit married Maria Spekman, a woman fifteen years his elder who lived in his neighborhood, which was known as the Jordaan.

Wartenaar was the draughtsman for a natural history publication commissioned by Pieter Cramer and produced by Caspar Stoll.

Cramer, the director of a scientific society in Zeeland, had assembled an extensive collection of colourful butterflies and moths (Lepidoptera) and arranged to publish the drawings, but died before the work was completed.

[2] Between 1775 and 1782 four volumes appeared in Amsterdam of De uitlandsche Kapellen voorkomende in de drie Waereld-Deelen Asia, Africa en America - Papillons exotiques des trois parties du monde l'Asie, l'Afrique et l'Amerique.

As most of the insect specimens used by Cramer and Stoll to describe new species have long since perished, the original drawings now have a special scientific status as iconotypes.