Lot 83: WALLICH, Nathaniel (1786-1854). Plantae asiaticae rariores; or, Descriptions and figures of a select number of unpublished East Indian Plants . London: [Richard Taylor for] Treuttel and Würtz, [1829]-1830-1832.

WALLICH, Nathaniel (1786-1854). Plantae asiaticae rariores; or, Descriptions and figures of a select number of unpublished East Indian Plants. London: [Richard Taylor for] Treuttel and Würtz, [1829]-1830-1832. 3 volumes, 2o (525 x 360 mm.), 295 hand-colored lithographic plates on 294 sheets, by M. Gauci and Weddell after Gorchand, Vishnu Prasad, M. Curtis, Miss Drake, and others, plates 222/223 constituting one folding plate, printed by Engelmann, Graf, Coindet & Co., Engelmann & Co., and Graf & Soret, one hand-colored engraved plate (plate 6 in vol. I), plates 226-300 constituting one folding double-page engraved map. (A few plates with marginal surface soiling, a few plates trimmed touching imprint, some light spotting predominately to text leaves.) Contemporary tan morocco gilt, spines in 6 compartments with 5 raised bands gilt, gilt-lettered in 2, edges gilt (rebacked preserving original spines, corners renewed, rubbed, hinges starting, upper cover of vol. 2 partially detached). A MAGNIFICENT RENDERING OF INDIAN PLANTS according to European taste, including on the first plate the orchid tree (Amherstia nobilis) which the author found near a derelict monastery on the Salween river in what is now Myanmar. Like Roxburgh's earlier Plants of the Coast of Coromandel, this work was heavily subsidized by the East India Company, who even employed the same team of artists at the Calcutta botanic garden where Wallich served as director from 1817 to 1846. The Indian plant illustrator Gorchand executed 146 watercolor paintings for the work, and his colleague Vishnu Prasad 109, "but all that is known about these two is their miserable pay - they received the same salary as scribes" (Lack). Wallich had several years' leave of absence in England to supervise the printing and coloring. According to his preface, the skilled colorist was "Mr. John Clark." Arnold Arboretum p. 729; Dunthorne 326 ("many decorative plates all well and carefully drawn"); Great Flower Books; H. Walter Lack, Ein Garten Eden, Cologne: 2001, 70; Nissen BBI 2099; Pritzel 9957; Stafleu-Cowan TL2 16583. (3)