L'Histoire de la nature des oyseaux, avec leurs descriptions, & naifs portaicts retirez du naturel: escrite en sept livres

by BELON, Pierre (1517-1564)

Price: $30,000.00
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Book desription: Paris: [colophon: imprime ... par Benoist Prevost] On les vend en la grand salle du Palais, en la boutique de Gilles Corrozet, 1555. 7 parts in one volume, folio. (12 3/4 x 8 1/4 inches). General title-page with integral large woodcut printer's device, 6 divisional titles with similar smaller devices, each hand-coloured. Uncoloured woodcut portrait of Belon on the verso of the general title, 2 large hand-coloured woodcuts offering a comparison of the skeletons of a human and a bird, 158 woodcuts of individual birds, all finely hand-coloured, numerous uncoloured woodcut headpieces and initials (some historiated). 17th century full calf, covers bordered in a blind double fillet with small arabesque designs in blind at the corners, rebacked to style, spine in six compartments with raised bands, ruled in gilt on either side of each band and titled in gilt in the second compartment. The Seymour-Lindsey-Bridgeman copy: a very rare hand-coloured copy of the first edition of one of the most important natural history books of the Renaissance and "one of the earliest books dealing entirely with birds" (Zimmer). In this work, Belon attempted to match the names of birds used by Aristotle and Pliny with the species then in France. He was a pioneer of comparative anatomy, illustrating and describing the homologies of human and avian skeletons. L'Histoire de la nature des oyseaux was also one of the first ornithological compendiums to be based, at least in part, on field observations, and many of the woodcut bird portraits were taken from actual specimens. In the Preface, Belon acknowledges the work of artist Pierre Goudet, but evidently a number of artists contributed to the work, with some of the cuts signed with an arrow, a Lorraine cross, a white cross in a black lozenge, or unsigned. Pierre Belon du Mans studied medicine in Paris, where he took the degree of doctor before becoming a pupil of the brilliant botanist Valerius Cordus at Wittenberg, with whom he travelled throughout Germany. Cordus died of malaria in Italy in 1544, and Belon, on his return to France, came under the patronage of François de Tournon. De Tournon provided him with the means that allowed Belon in 1546 to undertake a wide-ranging journey, apparently of scientific intent. He travelled through Greece, Asia Minor, Egypt, Arabia and Palestine, returning to Paris in 1549, where a full account of the journey was published in 1553. Besides the narrative of his travels he wrote several scientific works of considerable value. Perhaps taking his working methods from his former mentor Cordus, Belon published the Histoire naturelle des estranges poissons in 1551, followed by De arboribus coniferis and De aquatilibus in 1553, and then the present work in 1555. The cost of publishing this first edition was shared by two Parisian publishers: Guillaume Cavellet and Gilles Corrozet. There are therefore two issues of the first edition, but with neither taking precedence: the present example was published by Corrozet, with the Heart-Rose device on the titles (a visual pun on his name: coeur rose). The present example has obviously had a distinguished past: the Lindsey and the Seymour families were both important families in the 16th century. The colouring is exceptionally fine and remarkably accurate and, apart from any aesthetic considerations, would have added greatly to the value of the work as a reference. Hand-coloured copies of this work are not unknown, but they are very rarely found on the market. Anker 9; Ellis/Mengel 221; Mortimer French 50; Nissen IVB 86; Ronsil 189; Wood p.230; Zimmer p.52.

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