Antique Natural HistoryOriginal plates from the naturalists' books, 1600s to 1900s
Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869
Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, view 2

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Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, close-up 1Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, close-up 2Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, close-up 3

Framed and on the wall

Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, shown framedRare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, shown framed on a wallRare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869, shown framed in a room

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

Rare Large Antique Bird Print Depicting Xantus's Murrlets, 1869

£1,020 ($1,350, €1,200)

Period original, not a reproduction.

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Shipped from the Netherlands, flat, insured and tracked, worldwide. Returns accepted within 14 days.

Date
1869
Size
16.1 × 19.7 in (41 × 50 cm)
Condition
Very good, general age-related toning. Please study image carefully.
Period
Late 19th century
Section
Birds
Reference
f_27227092

Xantus's murrelets, plate title "Brachyramphus Hypoleucus", an original large folio lithograph with hand color from Daniel Giraud Elliot's The New and Heretofore Unfigured Species of the Birds of North America. The work was published in New York for the author between 1866 and 1869, with plates lithographed and colored by Bowen & Co. of Philadelphia.

The composition is a seabird scene on a rocky coast. One murrelet, dark above and white below, stands upright on a mossy ledge at the right, a second stands higher on the cliff behind, and a third flies low across the water at the center. Small gulls and distant swimming birds dot the sea, which fades into a pale pink and blue horizon at the left. The lettering at the lower left reads "Drawn from Nature by D.G. Elliot, F.Z.S.", with the Bowen & Co. imprint at the lower right.

Elliot's folio concentrated on species of the American West, including the Pacific coast, that Wilson and Audubon had not figured. Many of his subjects were drawn from specimens brought back by government expeditions and private collectors.