Antique Print of Greenland Shark with Anatomical Details – Paris, 1845

1845 · Views & Engravings

Antique Print of Greenland Shark with Anatomical Details – Paris, 1845

Name: Antique Print of Greenland Shark with Anatomical Details – Paris, 1845
Brand: American Maps and Prints
SKU: BG-09925
Price: 705 USD
Availability: InStock

$705

€630 · dollar price at today's exchange rate

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Shipping to the United States: $51 standard, $73 express, insured and tracked.

Date: 1845
Kind: Views & Engravings
Size: 34 × 48.7 cm (13.4 × 19.2 in)
Condition: Good. Good condition overall. Some faint foxing, mostly in the outer margins. Plate mark strong. Slight creasing in the lower left margin. Image and colors well preserved.
Period: Westward Expansion & Civil War
Reference: BG-09925

What the condition grades mean

Excellent: Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
Very good: Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
Good: Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
Fair: Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.

Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.

Guaranteed original. This is an original of the period stated, not a later reproduction or print-on-demand copy. If it is ever shown to be otherwise, we refund you in full.

Shipping to the United States. Sent from our gallery in Langweer, the Netherlands, flat between boards or rolled in a tube, and fully insured. Delivery and import charges.

About this piece

A Greenland shark shown with studies of its teeth, head and skin, a lithograph from the French scientific publication Voyage en Islande et au Groenland, published in Paris by Arthus Bertrand around 1845. The plate is headed "Zoologie" and the name "Le Lémargue boréal" is lettered below the main figure.

The shark appears in profile in the lower half of the sheet, drawn in cool gray tones with pale vertical bands along its flank, a blunt rounded head and a small mouth with its teeth just showing. Above it, three studies are laid out in a row: the upper and lower teeth at the left, a ventral view of the head and open jaw at the center, and a small patch of skin covered with rough denticles at the right. The plate is drawn with fine line work and very light color, and its artists and the publisher are named in the margins; the old description names Oudart as the draftsman and gives the plate number as "Poissons Pl. 1."

The species is now Somniosus microcephalus, a slow cold-water shark that is known to live for centuries.

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