Jacques-Louis-Florentin Engramelle (1734 – 1814)

Papillons d'Europe, Peints d'apres Nature

8 volumes in 6, 4to: 4 text volumes, (13 4/8 x 9 6/8 inches), volume one with list of subscribers, half-titles and engraved title-pages; 2 plate volumes (12 x 9 4/8 inches) (part 8 has an altered title-page from volume 5 and may be lacking several text leaves near the end), 2 hand-colored engraved title-pages, uncolored engraved title-page to part 2, 3 uncolored plates and 334 of 350 hand-colored engraved plates depicting butterflies by Jean-Jacques Ernst and Maria Eleonora Hochecker. EArly 19th-century burgundy morocco by Wilson over marbled paper boards (rebacked to style in the 20th-century). Condition: repairs to title pages of first plate volume, light spotting to preliminaries; wear to corners and extremities.

ONE OF THE FINEST BOOKS ON BUTTERFLIES.

8 volumes in 6, 4to: 4 text volumes, (13 4/8 x 9 6/8 inches), volume one with list of subscribers, half-titles and engraved title-pages; 2 plate volumes (12 x 9 4/8 inches) (part 8 has an altered title-page from volume 5 and may be lacking several text leaves near the end), 2 hand-colored engraved title-pages, uncolored engraved title-page to part 2, 3 uncolored plates and 334 of 350 hand-colored engraved plates depicting butterflies by Jean-Jacques Ernst and Maria Eleonora Hochecker. EArly 19th-century burgundy morocco by Wilson over marbled paper boards (rebacked to style in the 20th-century). Condition: repairs to title pages of first plate volume, light spotting to preliminaries; wear to corners and extremities.

ONE OF THE FINEST BOOKS ON BUTTERFLIES.  

First edition, one of about 250 sets printed for subscribers, with beautiful plates of butterflies and moths by Ernst and Hochecker, and text by Augustinian monk Engramelle. These plates are numbered consequtively I-CCCXXVI:

Plates I-LIV;

Plates LV - LXX are additionally etched in the plate block as supplemental plates 'I', and additionally numbered I-XVI;

Plate LXXI;

Plates LXXII - LXXIX are supplemental plates 'I', additionally numbered XVIII - XXV;

Plates LXXX - LXXXIV are supplemental plates 'II', additionally numbered 1-5;

Then supplemental plates 'III', numbered I - VIII;

Then finally Plates LXXXV - CCCXXVI;

For a total of 334 plates, plus 3 engraved title-pages, and 3 uncoloured plates.

Originally commissioned by Jean Baptiste Francois Gigot d'Orcy (1737-1793), Inspector of Mines, later Receiver General of Finances for la généralité de Châlons, whose extensive collection of minerals was acquired in 1825 on behalf of Yale College by Benjamin Silliman (1779 – 1864). In addition to his collection of minerals, d'Orcy had a fine cabinet of natural history specimens, including the butterflies featured in Engramelle's book. The first fascicle was published in 1779, before the French Revolution, the last in 1793, the year of the Terror. Nissen ZBI, 1300.