The British Figworts, Antique Natural History Print by Pratt, circa 1873

This antique botanical plate is Plate 154 of Anne Pratt's The Flowering Plants, Grasses, Sedges, and Ferns of Great Britain. It shows the five British figworts, wild plants noticed more for their foliage than for their small flowers. Small round flowers of a deep maroon brown are carried on wiry branching stalks across the whole upper half of the sheet, each no bigger than a pea and glossy where the light catches it. Below them the broad toothed leaves of the knotted and balm leaved species are drawn in fresh green, with the square ridged stems clearly shown.

Issued in London by Frederick Warne and Co. for the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, The Flowering Plants, Grasses, Sedges, and Ferns of Great Britain was Anne Pratt's largest work and the one that made her name. She drew the plants as well as describing them, and the six volumes were printed in color by William Dickes, whose press specialized in natural history plates. This sheet is from Volume IV.

The work was one of the first thorough illustrated floras of Britain aimed at the ordinary reader rather than the specialist, and the price was only possible because the plates were printed in color instead of being colored by hand. That technical choice is part of what the sheet records, and it put a reliable colored figure of every British species within reach of a wide public for the first time.

Even age toning. Handling soiling along the bottom, right and top edges. Scattered light foxing in the margin. All four corners complete. Several larger brown marks.

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