Archibald Thorburn | British Birds, 4 volumes PLUS supplementary part, 1915-18

Archibald Thorburn

British Birds... with eighty plates in colour, showing over four hundred species (supplementary part). London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1915-1916, 1918 [supplement]

FIRST EDITION, 4 volumes plus supplement, together 5 volumes, folio (401 x 325mm.) volumes 1, 3, and 4 are number 23 of 105 copies, volume 2 is number 39, 80 ornithological colour plates mounted on card with tissue guards, prospectus and publisher's advertisement sheet loosely inserted, original red buckram with gilt fillet border, top edges gilt, supplementary part with 2 colour plates in original printed wrappers, light foxing to some pages, spine lightly faded, extremities slightly rubbed

Archibald Thorburn (1860-1935) was a Scottish artist known principally for his watercolours of birds. Born in Lasswade, Midlothian, and educated in Edinburgh and at St. John's Wood School of Art, London, he gained widespread recognition when commissioned to produce illustrations for Coloured Figures of the Birds of the British Isles in 1887. He exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy, designed the first Christmas card for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds in 1899, and was asked to paint Queen Victoria on three separate occasions.

LITERATURE:

Anker 508; Nissen IVB 938; Zimmer II, p.624