Beschreibung:

BUC'HOZ, PIERRE JOSEPH. Les Dons merveilleux et diversement coloriés de la nature dans le règne végétal, ou collection de plantes precieusement coloriés, pour servir à l'intelligence de l'histoire générale et oeconomique des 3 regnes, et formant suite a la Collection des Fleurs curieuses et enluminées, qu'on cultive tant dans les jardins de la Chine, que dans ceux de l'Europe. Paris: chez l'auteur, [1779-1783]. 2 vols., folio, 450 x 285 mm., contemporary French pale mottled calf, sides with gilt borders of a small outer roll, single gilt fillet and a large roll inside, spines in seven compartments with six raised bands, green morocco gilt-lettered labels in two compartments, a repeated gilt panel with central gilt flower tool in the rest, blue and maroon patterned endpapers, g.e., lower corners of vol. 2 a little worn, trifling wear to foot of spine of vol. 1. FIRST EDITION. Calligraphic title-page to each volume, 2 pp. engraved index at end of vol. 2, 200 engraved plates, colored by hand, numbered in one series with some numbers deleted in the press (due to their previous use in others of his earlier works). MAGNIFICENT COPY, finely colored, of "one of the more important works of the copious Pierre Joseph Buc'hoz" -- Hunt. Although he is held in low esteem by the scientific botanists, due to his persistence in re-using plates with different attributions, his decorative and artistic sense places him high in the ranks of eighteenth-century flower book authors. Some copies have title-pages dated 1779 and 1783. Dunthorne 61; Great Flower Books , p. 52; Hunt 656; Nissen BBI 283; Pritzel 1327. (2)