Plants of the Americas (Folio Society Limited Edition)

JACQUIN, Nikolaus Joseph von (commentary Christopher Mills). Selectarum Stirpium Americanarum Historia. London: The Folio Society, 2016. 2 vols.

Oversize Folio. Main volume bound in quarter goatskin and illustrated cloth, spine titled in gilt, cover illustration by Neil Gower. Printed on Natural Evolution paper by Castelli Bolis. 264 full-page colour illustrations throughout. Accompanied by an envelope containing three loose facsimile prints, and a smaller commentary volume by Christopher Mills (vii, 42 pp.). Both volumes and accompanying material housed together in a purple buckram solander case, lettered in gilt. Facsimile limited edition. First edition thus. Limited to 750 numbered copies, this being number 484. A facsimile of the original copy of the second edition (Vienna, 178081) held in the Library, Art & Archives Collections of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin (17271817) was twenty-seven years old when the Holy Roman Emperor Francis I dispatched him to the West Indies and Central America in 1754, tasked with collecting botanical specimens for the Imperial gardens at Schnbrunn. The expedition von Jacquin undertook was extraordinary: Jacquin sent his companions home in succession, laden with plants, while he himself was captured by the British and held prisoner for over a year before his release, after which he continued collecting across Cuba and Jamaica before finally returning to Vienna in 1759.

This excellent Folio Society facsimile is based upon the Second Edition of von Jacquin’s work. It is difficult to overstate how singular that second edition is as an object. Rather than a reissue of the first edition, von Jacquin had each of the 264 illustrations individually hand-painted in watercolour, gouache, ink, and graphite directly onto the pages of a small number of copies. Christopher Mills, in his commentary for this facsimile, describes the resulting book as “one of the most beautiful and intriguing books of the eighteenth century,” adding that it is “indisputably one of the rarest.” The specific copy reproduced here (held today by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew) carries its own distinguished history: bound by Christian Kalthoeber, the German-born London binder so celebrated in his own time that he was invited by Catherine the Great to work in St Petersburg, and previously owned by the noted bibliophiles George Hibbert and Beriah Botfield.

This facsimile edition allows readers and collectors access to a work that exists nowhere else in a form that can be reasonably consulted or acquired; the genuine originals being, in the words of the Folio Society’s own description, among “the great books of botanic art,” and effectively unobtainable outside a handful of major institutional collections.

Fine. Impeccably preserved. All volumes and contents fine in like solander case. A spectacular copy.

Please note: This item is very large and heavy. Within Australia, it may require additional postage costs. For international shipping, the postage costs are sure to be substantial.

This book is currently on display in the rare book section of our Penrith store.
If you would like more information or to arrange a viewing, please contact: [email protected]

Catalogue Number: HH000155