James Edward Smith / James Sowerby - Lot

Lot of 20 boards; Type: Etching; Support: Heavy paper; Condition: excellent black-and-white engraving impression with contemporaneous coloring, good preservation with slight traces of foxing and browning; Shipment insured via Bartolini/DPD courier. To benefit from the insurance coverage, any damage to the parcel must be contested and reported to the courier at the time of delivery. Otherwise, the insurance reimbursement procedure cannot be activated. Publisher: J. DAVIS, and sold by Owner J. SOWERBY James Sowerby (London, March 21, 1757 – Lambeth, October 25, 1822) was an English illustrator and naturalist. Illustration of Acer campestre by J. Sowerby Fostering his passion for the natural sciences, he studied botany, mineralogy, geology, paleontology, malacology, and mycology, painting hundreds of descriptive plates. He studied art at the Royal Academy of London and worked with William Curtis, whose botanical work, Flora Londinensis, he curated the illustrations for. Works Sir James Edward Smith & James Sowerby (1790-1814). English Botany, 36 vols. James Sowerby (1796-1815). Coloured figures of English Fungi or Mushrooms, 3 vols. Sir James Edward Smith (Norwich, December 2, 1759 – March 17, 1828) was an English entomologist and botanist, founder and first president of the Linnean Society of London. Having been interested in flora and the natural sciences from a very young age, he studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh, where he was among John Walker's students. In 1783 he moved to London. There, in the following year, he had the opportunity to purchase, saving it, the entire Swedish natural history collection of Linnaeus, comprising thousands of species of plants, insects, and mollusks, as well as documents and books. The publicity of this initiative helped Smith gain admission to the Royal Society. From 1786 he joined the Grand Tour travelers, visiting botanical gardens, museums, and herbariums in the Netherlands, France, Italy, and Switzerland. Returning to London in 1788, he founded the Linnean Society, which he presided over until his death. His library and his botanical collection gained great fame, attracting many entomologists and botanists from all over Europe. Between 1808 and 1819 he wrote over 3,000 articles on botany for the New Cyclopaedia, Abraham Rees's universal dictionary of the arts and sciences. Among his best-known publications are Flora Britannica and the four volumes of Flora English published between 1824 and 1828. Among his entomological writings, particular importance was given to Storia naturale degli insetti rari di Georgia (Natural History of Rare Insects of Georgia) published in 1797, in which he dealt especially with rare species of Lepidoptera present in that American state. Many of his unpublished memoirs were posthumously published in 1832, edited by his wife.

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