ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE ZOOLOGY OF SOUTH AFRICA (Limited edition)

A facsimile reprint of the original work published in London during 1849

With an introduction by R. F. Kennedy

Volume 1 Mammals, Volume 2 Birds, Volume 3 Reptiles, Fish & Invertebrates

Facsimile reprint: 3 volumes: 268 + 494 + 703 pages, frontispiece portrait in volume 1, 17 + 114 + 113 colour plates, sellotape marks on the front and back paste down end papers in each volume, full brown leather binding with title and decorative gilt on the spine, a very good set.

The limitation reads: This edition is limited to 350 numbered sets. This is set no 44.

Kirby (P.) Sir Andrew Smith's Zoology, A re-examination of the facts relating to its publications. Africana Notes & News, volume II, no. I. December 1944, pages 3-15. 

Andrew Smith from the moment of his arrival in South Africa in 1821, interested himself in the natural history of the sub-continent. He began immediately to collect and to preserve specimens, and to publish descriptions of them wherever possible, both in South Africa and overseas. He founded the South African Museum in June, 1825, and issued the first part of a descriptive catalogue of some of the contents in 1826. He published in The South African Commercial Advertiser a series of articles which were intended to give in outline the zoology of South Africa, and he was the leading spirit in the founding of the first scientific paper to be published in the country, The South African Quarterly Journal, to which he contributed many valuable ornithological notes. He went on quite a number of scientific expeditions during his stay in South Africa, but it was his great expedition of 1834-1836 that supplied the bulk of the material for his classic work on South African Zoology.'