John Gould - The Birds of Great Britain

The Birds of Great Britain

The University of Glasgow, which owns a copy of the work describes John Gould as ‘the greatest figure in bird illustration after Audubon’, and auctioneers ‘Sotherans Co.’ describe ‘Birds of Great Britain’ as ‘Gould's pride and joy’.

Gould had already published some of the illustrations in ‘Birds of Europe’ but ‘Birds of Great Britain’ represents a development of his aesthetic style in which he adds illustrations of nests and young on a large scale.

‘Sotherans Co.’ reports that Gould published the book himself, producing 750 copies, which remain sought after both as complete volumes, and as individual plates, currently varying in price from £450 - £850. The University of Glasgow records that the volumes were issued in London in 25 parts, to make the complete set, between 1863 and 1873, and each set contained 367 coloured lithographs.

Gould undertook an ornithological tour of Scandinavia in 1856, in preparation for the work, taking with him the artist Wolf who would draw 57 of the plates from Gould’s preparatory sketches. According to The University of Glasgow Gould’s skill was in rapidly producing rough sketches from nature (a majority of the sketches were drawn of newly killed specimens) capturing the distinctiveness of each species. Gould then oversaw the process whereby his artists would work his sketches up into the finished drawings, which were then made into coloured lithographs by engraver William Hart.

There were problems, the stone engraving of the Snowy Owl in vol. I was dropped and broken at an early stage in the printing. Later issues of this plate show evidence of this damage and consequently the early issue - printed before the accident - are considered more desirable.

The lithographs were hand coloured, and writing the introduction for the work Gould states ‘every sky with its varied tints and every feather of each bird were coloured by hand; and when it is considered that nearly two hundred and eighty thousand illustrations in the present work have been so treated, it will most likely cause some astonishment to those who give the subject a thought.’

The work has gathered critical acclaim: according to Mullens and Swann, ‘Birds of Great Britain’ is ‘the most sumptuous and costly of British bird books’, whilst Wood describes it as ‘a magnificent work.’ Isabella Tree, writes that it ‘was seen - perhaps partly because its subject was British, as the culmination of ... genius’.

In 2012 Auctioneer Peter Harrington described a complete edition of 5 volumes as follows: 5 volumes, folio (580 × 350 mm). Finely bound by Tuckett (binder to the Queen) in contemporary full green Morocco, spines elaborately gilt in compartments, raised bands, ruling and elaborate floral rolls to boards gilt, yellow coated endpapers, all edges gilt. 367 fine, handcoloured lithograph plates by Richter and Hart after Gould and Wolf, heightened with gum-Arabic.