A New Dictionary of Natural History; or, Compleat Universal Display of Animated Nature with accurate representations of the most curious and beautiful animals, elegantly coloured

London : Harrison and Co , 1785 A rare and beautiful introduction to natural history. In 2 folio volumes with 99 (of 100) hand coloured plates by Moses Harris and others after his style. Martyn is a pseudonym for William Fordyce Mavor, who authored a wide range of works. The books are set out alphabetically, with the plates reflecting this classification, so they can portray lizards and lynx side by side on the same plate. The pages are double column and unpaginated. The text for each animal is thoughtfully put together eg for the guinea pig 'The Guinea-Pig is a very cleanly creature and totally different from that that affords it a name....Guinea-Pigs repose on their bellies, pretty much in their usual posture...'. The plates are nicely coloured and the ones by Moses Harris (butterflies, moths and shells) are particularly well drawn. This copy is in a contemporary half leather binding with marbled boards. The half leather corners have been replaced with a paper cover. There is some wear to boards and corners but overall they are in good condition. The spines are leather with raised bands and gilt decoration. There are title and volume labels. There is some wear to joints, particularly on Vol I, where there is some cracking at the front hinge, but the bindings are currently sound. Contents generally clean with occasional marking and some edge tearing. There are some pencil notes at the beginning of both volumes. The paper used in this work is particularly soft and prone to edge-tearing. Vol I: red and black title page; Preface; covers A-K; 55 plates; new rear endpaper. A couple of plates have margin/edge tears - Plate I has tear at the top margin with a small piece missing at the corner and a tear at the bottom margin again missing corners; Plate XLVII has a small piece missing from the bottom edge and a repair. The title page has a small hole and 2 repaired edge tears. Vol II: 44 of 45 plates; title page in red and black; text and plates L-Z; 2pp listing of plates; Finis. There is some offsetting from plates to text, occasional browning to pages; and some edge-tearing. Please enquire if you would like more images to assess condition.