Beschreibung:

A Monograph of the Felidae of family of the cats.
London: [1878-]1883. Folio (602 x 480 mm). Mounted on guards throughout. 44 hand-colored lithographic plates, extra-illustrated with 4 loosely-inserted hand-colored lithographic “pattern” plates. Later green half morocco over green morocco-grained cloth, covers tooled in gilt, and titled on upper cover, the spine in seven compartments with raised bands, deep-purple morocco lettering-pieces. Condition : repairs and restoration to most text leaves and many of the plates, 3 of the plates with the image area affected. Provenance : Quentin Keynes (gift to his doctor). a complete copy of elliot’s excellent monograph, including four very important ‘pattern’ plates . In this magnificent work Elliot described and had pictured all the species of cats then known. The work was prompted by a perceived need to resolve the confusion that had built up around the naming of the various species of Felidae, particularly amongst the smaller cats. Wolf worked from specimens provided by Elliot, who visited all the great museums and zoological societies on both sides of the Atlantic. As the final proofs of the individual uncoloured lithographic plates were completed they would have been given to Wolf. Working from his own original paintings, he would then have colored individual prints and produced an entire set a of “pattern plates”. These were then given to the skilled colorists who worked on the multple ciopies of the plates, coloring them according to the “pattern plates”. This copy of Elliot's work includes four of these probably unique “pattern plates”, probably colored by the artist himself. The images are of the “African Golden Cat”, the “African Wild Cat, or Kaffir Cat”, the “Serval” and the “Jaguar”. Joseph Wolf's work for Elliot marks the high-point of his illustrative work and his images of the cats are considered by many to be his masterpieces. After serving an apprenticeship with a Koblentz firm of lithographers, and spending some time working in Leiden and Darmstadt, Wolf moved to London in 1848. The quality of his images was recognised immediately and he was rarely without work, producing natural history pictures of the highest quality for John Gould Henry Dresser, George Gray and the Zoological Society of London amongst many others. BM(NH) II,p.522; cf. Nissen ZBI 1279; cf. Wood p.332.