Antique Natural HistoryOriginal plates from the naturalists' books, 1600s to 1900s
Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854
Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, view 2

Close-ups

Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, close-up 1Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, close-up 2Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, close-up 3

Framed and on the wall

Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, shown framedAntique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, shown framed on a wallAntique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854, shown framed in a room

Frame and rooms are illustrations of how the print could look; the description says what is included.

Antique Print of Arctic Skate or Gaimard’s Ray, Hand-Colored Lithograph, 1854

£745 ($985, €880)

Period original, not a reproduction.

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Date
1854
Size
19.2 × 13.4 in (48.7 × 34 cm)
Condition
Good. Very good overall. Minor foxing mostly in the outer margins. A small water stain is present at the bottom center edge, not affecting the main image. Plate impression strong, and coloring remains clean and detailed.
Period
Late 19th century
Section
Fish and shells
Reference
f_45534442

A skate seen from below, "La Raie de Gaimard," a hand-colored lithograph from the French scientific publication Voyage en Islande et au Groenland, published in Paris by Arthus Bertrand. The plate is headed "Zoologie" and numbered "Poissons Pl. 3" at the upper right. The old description gives it as 1845; the date field reads 1854.

The skate fills the upper part of the sheet, its broad diamond-shaped body drawn in olive and brown tones with fine radiating lines across the wings and a sharply pointed snout, and its long slender tail trailing to the lower left with small fins at the tip. The underside shows the mouth and gill slits and the pelvic fins, and a separate study at the lower right shows the plated teeth of the mouth, drawn in pale brown. The names of the artist Oudart and the engraver H. Blanchard appear in the lower margins.

The species is named for Joseph Paul Gaimard, the naval surgeon and naturalist who took part in French scientific voyages to the north in the 1830s.