Der Kinderen, Frans

4to (288 x 230mm.), 113 fine watercolour drawings of flowers, including 33 tulips, 16 carnations, 6 roses, 58 others, including hyacinths, ranunculi, lilies, crocuses, narcissi, etc., 29 drawings embellished with the addition of butterflies, beetles and so on, drawing incorporating an engraving by Jan Goeree, cut round, laid down, hand-coloured and heightened in gilt, 18pp. of contemporary manuscript at end with descriptions of most of the plants, contemporary Dutch vellum gilt, a few minor paper repairs, some occasional spotting

By family descent; sale (“the property of a gentleman”), Christie’s Amsterdam, 14 November 1994, lot 147

J.H. van Eeghen, "De Familiekronick van Frans der Kinderen" in Jaarboek Amstelodamum 64 (1972), p. 153

A MAGNIFICENT FLORILEGIUM, reflecting in 113 original drawings the Dutch enthusiasm for the most sumptuous and colourful flowering plants. At their previous appearance at auction (see provenance, below) the drawings were attributed to Frans der Kinderen (1667-1737), on the basis of similarity to another manuscript described by J.H. van Eeghen (see references). Der Kinderen’s will makes explicit mention of the bequest of his "blomboek" to his son, which we may suppose to be the present volume.

The volume is a testament to the fact that, while the tulipomania of the seventeenth century had abated, the cultivation and depiction of flowering plants was still at the centre of Dutch culture. Indeed, at the time of the compilation of this florilegium, hyacinths were enjoying the same kind of speculative attention which tulips had enjoyed a century earlier.

Der Kinderer, a keen draughtsman and horticulturalist, who made these drawings as a record of flowers in his own garden, also had a keen interest in entomology, as evidenced by the inclusion of wonderfully detailed butterflies, moths and beetles.