Editing Camouflage (section)

=== Classical antiquity ===

[[File:Octopus cyaneain Kona.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|Octopuses like this ''[[Octopus cyanea]]'' can change colour (and shape) for camouflage]]

In ancient Greece, [[Aristotle]] (384–322 BC) commented on the colour-changing abilities, both for camouflage and for [[Signalling theory|signalling]], of [[cephalopod]]s including the octopus, in his ''[[Historia animalium]]'':<ref name=Aristotle>Aristotle (c. 350 BC). ''Historia Animalium''. IX, 622a: 2–10. Cited in Borrelli, Luciana; [[Francesca Gherardi|Gherardi, Francesca]]; Fiorito, Graziano (2006). ''A catalogue of body patterning in Cephalopoda''. Firenze University Press. {{ISBN|978-88-8453-377-7}}. [http://www.fupress.com/scheda.asp?IDV=487 Abstract] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180206145302/http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/history_anim.9.ix.html |date=6 February 2018 }}</ref>

{{blockquote|The [[octopus]]&nbsp;... seeks its prey by so changing its colour as to render it like the colour of the stones adjacent to it; it does so also [[Deimatic behaviour|when alarmed]].|Aristotle<ref name=Aristotle/>}}