Histoire Naturelle des Quadrupedes Ovipares et des Serpens. 2 vols.

This is a rare or used book from the Berkelouw Rare Books Department.

Paris: H??tel de Thou, 1788-1789. Two thick small quarto volumes bound in original full tree calf (a little rubbed, lower edges slightly blemished). Spines gilt, with raised bands, and contrasting title-labels. Marbled endpapers. Complete with 63 full-page engraved plates, 2 large folding tables, decorated chapter headings, and illustrated tail-pieces. Fine clean copies. Rare. Impressed by Lac??p??de's (1756-1825) early scientific publications, Essai sur l'??lectrict?? naturelle et artificelle (1781) and Physique g??n??rale et particuli??re (1782-1784), in 1785 Buffon (1707-1788) invited Lac??p??de to continue his encyclopaedic Histoire naturelle and to this end appointed him keeper and sub-demonstrator at the Cabinet du Roi in Paris. Lac??p??de contributed the final eight volumes (of which the first two are here offered), on oviparous quadrupeds (1788), snakes (1789), fishes (1798-1803, 5 vols.), and cetaceans (1804), to his mentor's monumental work, complete in 44 quarto volumes. After the Reign of Terror, Lac??p??de accepted a professorship at the newly constituted Mus??um national d'Histoire naturelle. Lacepede Bay in South Australia was named after the celebrated French naturalist during Baudin's expedition to map the coast of Australia in 1800-1803. A rare and important early natural history treatise.