Beschreibung:

Georges-Louis-Marie Leclerc, comte de Buffon (1707-1788) Collection de planches d'histoire naturelle enluminées, par Martinet, exécutées par E.L. Daubenton le cadet . Paris: Panckoucke, 1765-1783]. 5 volumes, small 2° (308 x 228mm). 1003 (of 1008) fine hand-coloured engraved plates only, by François Nicolas Martinet and P. de La Ferté after Martinet under the supervision of Edmé Louis Daubenton the younger, comprising 973 plates of birds and 35 of butterflies and insects. (Lacking plate nos. 663, 679, 683, 696 and 757, plate 758 detached, neat repair to plate mark of plate no. 606, small wormtrack through plates 797 to 808.) Contemporary French mottled calf gilt, covers tooled with triple gilt fillet, spines in six compartments with raised bands, morocco lettering-piece in the second and third, the others with repeat decoration in gilt, gilt turn-ins, edges stained red (neat repairs to head and foot of spines and corners, extremities scuffed). The small-folio issue of the coloured plates was intended to illustrate the bird volumes of Buffon's great Histoire Naturelle Générale . In 1765 Edmé-Louis Daubenton, at Buffon's instigation, began the publication of 1008 plates, 973 of birds and 35 of butterflies and insects, in 42 parts, each part containing 24 plates. They were issued without title or text (save for an identification in French) but, as Zimmer notes, appear always to have been known as 'Daubenton's Planches Enluminées'. These plates in fact never accompanied the edition for which they were intended, owing to the small number produced, although Buffon did issue a special edition of the Histoire naturelle des Oiseaux to accommodate Daubenton's plates. THIS COPY THUS REPRESENTS THE WORK IN ITS ORIGINAL FORM, ISSUED WITHOUT TEXT. It is considerably rarer than the issue with text; only two other copies have been sold at auction in recent decades. Anker p.76; Fine Bird Books (1990) p.90; Nissen IVB 158; cf. Zimmer pp.104-6, and p.63; sold, as a collection of plates, not subject to return. (5)