SEBA - SOUTH AMERICAN CATFISH print - extremly rare original hand colouring 1734 - 1769

This very rare double page folio engraving - with original hand colouring of South American catfish from the Amazon Basin and the north coast of South America - is from Albertus Seba’s third volume of Locupletissimi rerum naturalium thesauri, published in Amsterdam by J. Weststen, William Smith, & Jansson-Waesburg between 1734 and 1769. 

“A volume valuable for its drawings of foreign fishes, superior to all others at that time…”   (Pietsch, Cuvier - Historical Portrait of the Progress of Ichthyology 1995)

Albertus Seba (1665 – 1736) was a wealthy pharmacist based in Amsterdam who over the years amassed an amazing array of exotic plants, corals, birds, fish, insects and animals from around the world. This extraordinary collection was known as his “Cabinet of Natural Curiosities” and his Thesaurus, based on this collection, remains one of the most prized natural history books of all time.  

Of the 449 illustrated plates only 13 are of fish.

These extremely rare copperplate engravings are both aesthetically appealing and highly desirable.  

(Ref: Müsch, Rust, & Willmann, Cabinet of Natural Curiosities, p. 29, 31; Pietsch,1995, p.99, 107; Dean, Bibl.of Fishes 1972, vol.3 p. 315)