[Nuremberg, les héritiers de feu G. W. Knorr, 1767]. Large folio (54.6 x 37.5 cm). One very beautiful hand-coloured engraved plate.

This is the splendid plate of peculiar large bird bills, from species belonging to the tropical African-Asian hornbill family (Bucerotidae). This plate is of the rare first edition of the large format French printing of Knorr's Deliciae Naturae Selectae oder auserlesenes Naturaliencabinet.... Knorr's Deliciae is a rare, truly great and sumptuously illustrated German natural history book from the 'Golden Age' of southern German printing. The plate, numbered I.4, was drawn and engraved by Johann Ludwig Colve (1750-1799), and engraved by Johann Sebastian Leitner (1715-1795), after specimens in the ‘Museum Breyniano’ [i.e., the collection of the Dresden physician Johann Philipp Breyn (1680-1764); see Dijkstra]. This plate is much larger than those in Knorr's other works. Clean and brightly coloured. Minimal fraying to the - uncut - edges, one very small, marginal spot, otherwise a very good, clean copy. Dijkstra (2014), A Collation of the Three Editions of Georg Wolfgang Knorr’s Conchological Work “Vergnügen” (1757-1775); Horn-Schenkling, 12038; Nissen ZBI, 2227.