Hottentots and Caffres of Southern Africa, Pair of Large Plates, 1806

This set of two original antique copper engravings, Plates 84 and 85 from Sonnerat's Voyage aux Indes Orientales et a la Chine, is sold as one set. They are two original sheets sold together as one lot, and the set is never split. Plate 84 shows a group of Hottentots of the Cape of Good Hope with their weapons, ornaments and skin cloaks, set in an open landscape across a wide folding sheet. Plate 85 shows a group of Caffres of southern Africa with spears, shields and ornaments, standing in an open landscape across a wide folding sheet. Each sheet carries its engraved plate number at the upper right, the artist and engraver credits at the foot of the image and its caption lettered beneath.

Pierre Sonnerat published his Voyage aux Indes Orientales et a la Chine in Paris in 1782, and the plates were reissued in this separate folio volume by Dentu in 1806 under the title Collection de planches pour servir au Voyage aux Indes Orientales et a la Chine. Every image was drawn by Sonnerat himself during the voyage he made for the French crown between 1774 and 1781 and then cut on copper by the Paris engravers who worked for him. They are original copperplate engravings, printed from the intaglio plates onto laid paper. The engraved plate number stands at the upper right, the artist and engraver credits run along the foot of the image and the caption is lettered beneath. The sheets are uncolored, as the plate volume was issued.

The large folding plates of peoples are the widest sheets in the volume, printed across a double page with a central fold, and they carry more landscape than the rest of the book. They belong to the section in which Sonnerat turned from India and China to the Cape of Good Hope on his way home. Both sheets are the same size and the same orientation and come from one volume of one book, which is why they are offered as a set and not one at a time. Sonnerat is remembered in the names of the things he found. The mangrove genus Sonneratia carries his name, so does the gray junglefowl Gallus sonneratii, and the botanical author abbreviation Sonn. stands for him. He was the first to put the name aye-aye into print, and the name indri entered European use through him as well. The plates in this volume are the record of that work.

Light uneven toning, browner towards the edges. Marked handling soiling along the edges of both sheets. Scattered light foxing in the margins of both sheets. Slight wear at the corners of both sheets.

These are original antique prints, not modern reproductions. This item is sold unframed.