Beautiful botanical work with 177 engravings, 1641 (-44)

Johann Theodor de Bry:

Florilegium renovatum et auctum: Das ist Vernewertes und vermehrtes Blumenbuch.

Frankfurt, bey Matthaeo Merian, 1641 [-1644]. Small folio. 30 x 19 cms.

14 pp. incl. engraved title + double-page engraved plate ”Hortus magnificus” of Schwinden (with some slight colouring) + 32 engraved plates + plates numbered 1-50, 50-129, 129-31, 133-42 (some folding). A total of 177 engravings, lacking only the final, unnumbered plate ”Hic flos rosarum Pragae repertus”, issued a few years later. With 2 additional botanical watercolours following the final plate.

Later half calf, slight superficial wear but fine, in a slipcase.

Engraved title laid down, with minimal paper loss in lower margin and slight finger-soiling, plate 4 in the first sequence torn in lower margin without loss and no 27 torn in lower margin with minimal paper loss, no 28 torn into image. In the second sequence plates nos 47, 50B, 73, 86, 87 are slightly torn into image, no 89 has slight damage to lower outer corner with insignificant paper loss, folding plates 113, 116, 123 and 142 are partly or entirely neatly laid down, thus repairing long tears into

image, lowermost portion of plate 85 torn off but preserved, a few neat repairs, eg. to versos of plates 1 and 84, ink stain to plates 51 and 58, one or two wormholes to plates 81-90.

Second, much enlarged edition of one of the most beautiful botanical books of the 17th century. Text in German.

"The unsurpassed artistry for which de Bry was renowned throughout Europe emerges clearly in the plates of the Florilegium. Each has been carefully composed, and the confident lines of the engraving, with their fine shading, denote the hand of a true master" (An Oak Spring Flora).

Nissen, Botanische Buchillustration, 274. Hunt Botanical Catalogue, 237.

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