Decorative plates for 'A Natural History of Birds' one of the most important and comprehensive of all English 18th-century natural history books.George Edwards FRS (3 April 1694 – 23 July 1773) was an English naturalist and ornithologist, known as the 'father of British ornithology'. Edwards was born at West Ham, then in the county of Essex. In his early years, he travelled extensively through mainland Europe, studying natural history, and gained a reputation for his coloured drawings of animals, especially birds. He was appointed as beadle to the Royal College of Physicians in 1733. He was an English draughtsman and a skilled observer of birds and one of the most prominent ornithologists of his day.Original hand-coloured copper engraved plate, some minor soiling, mainly to margins, paper size: 29.3cm x 23.5cm.Sitwell (Fine Bird Books), 1990 pp.93; Nissen (IVB), 286-88; Zimmer pp. 192-98.
