Versuch beÿ angehender Frühlings Zeit die Vergrößerungs Werckzeuge…Essai d’employer les Instruments Microscopiques…dans La Saison Du Printems.
Nürnberg, A.L. Wirsing 1764.
Tall folio (431 x 298 mm.). Etched bilingual title in fine contemporary hand color, 48p. and TWELVE ETCHED AND ENGRAVED PLATES WITH TWO HUNDRED FORTY FIGURES IN FINE CONTEMPORARY HAND COLOR (plate mark 310/25 x 225/31 mm.). Double-column German and French parallel text.
Contemporary mottled half-calf and dark blue pastepaper boards (spine and corners neatly repaired), gilt red morocco ownership label in French on the front cover of the marques de Ovando (De La Bibliotheque Du Marquis Dorando), red edges.
Only Edition, a classic focused on the form and structure of a dozen spring flowers, their parts and, in some cases, those of the insects they host. A lawyer and polymath, the author addresses well-to-do amateur naturalists, professional botanists and physicians. In addition to carefully recording the attributes of the individual specimens, his first-person descriptions are chatty and explain in laymen’s language the best techniques for preparing different sorts of specimens, which lenses and types of microscopes improve particular kinds of observations and species’ seasonal variations (for instance, the appearance and characteristics of the autumnal root or stem).
The text refers to some twenty authors, ranging from just their last name (Leeuwenhoek, Malpighi, Trew, Miller…) to exact citations to monographs giving edition date and page and plate and figure number, and to journals by volume, year and page. Ledermüller willingly poses questions to which he has no answer (a comfort to the beginner) and often marvels at the aesthetic and artistic quality of specimens. His final sentence encourages research: “Microscope enthusiasts will have a great opportunity to discover what still remains” (tr.). The text must have been written and published prior to his rupture in 1764 with his disciple, biologist Wilh. Fr. von Gleichen-Russworm (1717-83), who is here described in glowing terms.
Ledermüller drew the plates. The publisher, A.L. Wirsing (1733-97), engraved them, and Joh. Conr. Harrepeter (1735-94) supplied the French translation. In good condition (pale narrow stain along the outer edge of two leaves, first plate backed before binding, short tear neatly mended, four blank lower corners with a small splash, blank lower corner of most plates thumbed), engraved armorial bookplates of the soldier José Francisco de Ovando Solis y Ribadeneyra (1750-95), marqués de Ovando.
¶Stevenson, Catalogue of Botanical Books in the Collection of R.M.M. Hunt II(II): 581; Nissen, Die botanische Buchillustration 1160; Gourry, Mille et un livres botaniques 303; Blake, 18th Century Printed Books in the National Library of Medicine 261; Horn & Schenkling, Index litteraturae entomologicae 13094.
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