Beschreibung:

CATESBY, MARK. The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands: Containing the Figures of Birds, Beasts, Fishes, Serpents, Insects and Plants...with their Descriptions in English and French. London: printed at the expence of the author [1730]-1731-43. 2 vols., folio, 454 x 314mm. (17 7/8 x 12 3/8 in.), later eighteenth-century mottled calf, g.e., covers detached, joints renewed, spines abraded (essentially disbound), modern buckram slipcases, lacking the Appendix and its 20 plates, folding map creased, stained, and torn along folds, neatly repaired ten-inch tear to plate 2:35, pl. 2:61 (Magnolia) cropped and fore-edge badly frayed, pl. 2:80 and engraved headpiece to the "Account of Carolina" slightly shaved, vol. 1 text leaves C2 with nine-inch tear and G1 supplied from another copy (edges soiled and frayed), a few short marginal tears, pls. 1:100 and 2:32 slightly creased, light dampstaining to pl. 1:23, occasional marginal soiling, plates 24 and 25 in both vols. bound in inverted order . FIRST EDITION OF THE "FIRST MAJOR TREATISE DEVOTED ENTIRELY TO THE BIOTA OF THE NEW WORLD" (Ellis/Mengel), 200 hand-colored etched plates by and after Catesby and signed with his monogram, except for plates 61 and 96 in vol. 2, signed by Georg Dionysius Ehret hand-colored engraved folding map in vol. 1, one etched headpiece by Catesby, title-pages printed in red and black in English and French, bilingual text in two columns, ornamental woodcut initials, on paper watermarked Crowned Shield IV and Villedary (undated); pages 1-20 in vol. 2 mispaginated 121-140 and corrected in ms., the erroneously omitted word "black" inserted in ms. to line 21 on p. 54, pls. 62 and 80 in v. 2 misnumbered. Ellis/Mengel 476; Fine Bird Books p. 65; Great Flower Books p. 53; Hunt 486; Nissen/ BBI 336; Nissen IVB 177; Nissen ZBI 842; Stafleu TL-2 1057; Edwin Wolf 2nd, A Flock of Beautiful Birds Philadelphia 1977, pp. 5-7 ("He was the first to observe and depict American birds in their natural settings, combining ornithological details with botanical ones"). Contents of this copy : Vol. 1: Map; title; dedication "To the Queen"; Preface (pp. v-xii); plates 1-100 with letterpress descriptions. Vol. 2: Title; dedication "To Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales"; "A List of the Encouragers of this Work"; "An Account of Carolina..."; plates 100-200 with letterpress descriptions; Index (6 pp.) Provenance : Bookplates of E. A. and O[utram]. Bangs of Boston, both dated 1896 in ink. (2)