Set of 3 Hand-Colored Club Moss Engravings, Fir, Marsh and Alpine, 1806-1809

This is an original set of 3 antique hand-colored copper engravings of club mosses, sold together, from Christian Schkuhr's survey of the ferns and fern allies printed at Wittenberg between 1806 and 1809. Three club moss plates, Tab. 159 to 161, opening the lycopod sequence. The 3 sheets are Lycopodium reflexum, Lycopodium Selago, Lycopodium alopecuroides, Lycopodium inundatum and Lycopodium alpinum. They are the same size, printed from the same press and colored by the same hand, so they frame and hang as one group.

The plate comes from Christian Schkuhr's account of the twenty-fourth Linnaean class, the cryptogams, the plants that reproduce by spores rather than by flowers. Schkuhr, who was born at Pegau in 1741 and died at Wittenberg in 1811, worked first as a gardener, studied at the University of Wittenberg, and taught himself drawing and engraving so completely that he drew, engraved and published his own plates. The fern volume appeared in nine instalments between 1806 and 1809 and carries 221 plates, numbered to 173 with lettered supplements added as new material reached him.

The sheet is a copper engraving finished in watercolor by hand, and the coloring is original to the period of publication. The wash sits over the engraved outline and varies from figure to figure in the way hand work does, with the greens laid in several strengths to separate the upper and lower surfaces of the frond. The paper carries the plate mark of the copper plate. Fern plates hang well because the subject is shape rather than incident, and a sheet like this reads clearly from across a room. It suits a study, a hallway, a bathroom or a kitchen, and it sits comfortably with other botanical work, with natural history prints and with plain modern interiors where a single green form on cream paper is enough.

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

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