Fiddle Dock and Golden Dock, Antique Victorian Botanical Plate, circa 1873

An original antique botanical plate of the British flora, printed in color in London for Frederick Warne and Co., this sheet is given over to the fiddle dock and the golden dock with two more British docks. Shaggy golden flower spikes rise through the center of the sheet, bristling with the long teeth that mark the golden dock, and they give the plate an unexpected warmth. A large puckered olive green leaf of the broad leaved dock lies behind them at the left, the fiddle dock stands at the right, and the cut stems and leaf bases are drawn across the bottom.

The sheet is a plate from Volume IV of Anne Pratt's The Flowering Plants, Grasses, Sedges, and Ferns of Great Britain, published by Frederick Warne and Co. of London. Pratt wrote the text and drew the plants herself, and the plates were printed in color rather than painted by hand, which is what allowed a thorough illustrated flora to be sold at a price an ordinary reader could meet.

A plate from this flora carries its period in every line: the close observation, the crowded but orderly arrangement, the soft printed color laid over careful outline. It sits as comfortably in a modern interior as in a Victorian one, and it has the advantage over a single flower study of giving several related plants together, which makes it rewarding to look at more than once.

Even age toning. Handling soiling along the bottom and right edges. A few small foxing spots in the margin. Slight wear at the bottom right and top left corners. Minor edge wear, shallow nicks along the left.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.