Eleazar Albin Natural History of Birds, 1731

We are very pleased to offer these original engravings by Eleazar Albin from a fragment of the 1st English edition of The Natural History of Birds. This is the rarest and most highly prized of Albin’s works as it was hand coloured entirely by Albin and his daughter, Elizabeth. There were only 89 sets published, and we have linked the list of original subscribers below. It was a monumental undertaking seen only a few times in the history of natural history works and compares with the illustration of 60 editions of The Birds of Great Britain, with their Eggs by William Lewin and his sons and the colouring of 100 copies of Birds of America by Rex Brasher.

The Title Page of the publication reads, "Published by the Author Eleazar Albin, and carefully colour'd by his Daughter and Self, from the Originals, drawn from the live Birds."