Album de Pomologie - photo 1
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Album de Pomologie

Starting price
$ 8 000
Auction dateClassic
22.04.2021 10:00UTC -04:00
Auctioneer
CHRISTIE'S
Event location
USA, New York
Archive
The auction is completed. No bids can be placed anymore.
Archive
ID 517649
Lot 3 | Album de Pomologie
BIVORT, Alexandre Joseph (1809-1872). Album de Pomologie. Brussels: Librairie de Deprez-Parent, 1847-1851.

Prosper J. Berckmans's copy of the first edition of Bivort’s magnum opus, “a wonderful record of the great number of new fruits”(Bunyard). Published in monthly parts over four years, Album de Pomologie contains descriptions and lucious illustrations of many of the cultivars of the important Belgian agronomist Jean-Baptiste Van Mons, whose seed collection was acquired by Bivort after his death. Van Mons was the most prolific pear breeder of his age, and this obsession is borne out in Bivort’s album, of which about three-quarters is devoted to pears. The remainder consists of varieties of apples, cherries, stone fruits, grapes, and berries. Van Mons’s new fruits were imported to America, which responded in kind with their own contributions: American plums and peaches both make appearances in the album. This set comes from the library of the important Belgian-American horticulturalist, Prosper J. Berckmans. Berckmans and his father spent time in New Jersey experimenting with pear cultivars before ultimately near Augusta, Georgia, where he promoted agricultural reform and fruit cultivation in the American south. He founded both the Georgia State and the Richmond County agricultural societies, and was later elected president of the American Pomological Society. After his death, a tribute to him at the Georgia Horticulural society described him as "greatest pomologist the South has ever seen." The first volume of this set apparently had its lithographs removed at an early date, c.1855-6, with an aim to replace the images with original watercolors—of which only four were executed. “Not many complete copies seem to have survived” (Oak Spring Pomona). Oak Spring Pomona 53; Bunyard, A Guide to the Literature of Pomology, p. 441.

Four volumes, oblong folio (232 x 300mm). 2 lithographic additional titles by V. de Doncker; 143 hand-colored lithographs (of 192, lacking the prints in the first volume), a few only partially colored as usual; the first volume has had the prints replaced with sheets of cardstock, on four of which watercolor copies of the original plates are painted; an additional watercolor of pears with a pencil drawing on the reverse is laid in, along with a lithograph of Van Mons (spotting, largely to text leaves and especially to vol. 1 title page). Contemporary brown half morocco over brown cloth (vol. 1) and green cloth (vols. 2-4) with morocco title pieces on front board (vol. 1 hinge cracked, generally worn at joints and corners, boards a little scuffed). Provenance: Prosper J. Berckmans (1830-1910; by descent to current owners)
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