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BATEMAN, JAMES. 1811-1897. The Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala. London: J. Ridgway & Sons for the author, [1837-1843.] image 1
BATEMAN, JAMES. 1811-1897. The Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala. London: J. Ridgway & Sons for the author, [1837-1843.] image 2
BATEMAN, JAMES. 1811-1897. The Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala. London: J. Ridgway & Sons for the author, [1837-1843.] image 3
A Private Collection of Orchidacea
Lot 1

BATEMAN, JAMES. 1811-1897.
The Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala. London: J. Ridgway & Sons for the author, [1837-1843.]

22 June 2023, 12:00 EDT
New York

Sold for US$25,600 inc. premium

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BATEMAN, JAMES. 1811-1897.

The Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala. London: J. Ridgway & Sons for the author, [1837-1843.]
Large folio (735 x 530 mm). One-page subscriber's list; addenda & corrigenda slip bound at back. Lithographic pictorial title, 40 FINE HAND-COLORED LITHOGRAPHIC PLATES, drawn on stone by P. Gauci after Miss S.A. Drake (16), Mrs. Augusta Withers (21), Miss Jane Edwards (1), Samuel Holden (1) and one unsigned, one uncolored plan of "epiphyte-houses" and 38 wood-engraved vignettes, two by George Cruikshank. Contemporary brown half morocco and marbled boards, rebacked, corners repaired, rubbed front free endpaper loose; some staining to plates.
Provenance: MCR (19th-century monogram, bookplate).

FIRST EDITION OF ONE OF THE RAREST, AND "PERHAPS THE MOST RENOWNED AND SOUGHT-AFTER OF ALL ORCHID BOOKS" (W. Stearn John Lindley, p.133). "IN THIS BOOK, THE GREAT ORCHIDS OF CENTRAL AMERICA LIVE FOR US IN ALL THEIR GLORY" (Blunt). Limited to 125 copies, the work is "probably the finest, and certainly the largest, botanical book ever produced with lithographic plates ... In size and in splendour, Bateman's giant folio eclipses the works of all who went before or came after him. Maxim Gauci, who was born in Malta, executed the forty lithographs ... a master of the process, he ranged his tone from the palest of silvery greys to the richest velvet black; his outline is never mechanical or obtrusive; and the hand-colouring-whoever may be responsible for it is executed with consummate skill" (W. Blunt, The Art of Botanical Illustration, 1994, pp 249-251).

Bateman was a pioneer of the culture of orchids. "In 1833 he sent at his own expense, the collector Colley to Demerara and Berbice to collect plants ... Shortly afterwards he induced G. Ure Skinner, a merchant trading in Guatemala, to send him orchids. In 1837 he commenced the publication (of the present work) ... which he completed in 1843 .... Bateman was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society.. 1833 and of the Royal Society ... 1838 ... In 1867 he issued 'A Second Century of Orchidaceous Plants'... Between 1864 and 1874 he published "A Monograph of Odontglossum.' Bateman was not only the pioneer of orchid culture, he was also one of the first to advocate 'cool' orchid cultivation" (DNB). Great Flower Books, p 48; Nissen BBI 89; Stafleu & Cowan TL2 342.

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