Antique Print of the Siphonops Annulatus, the Ringed Caecilian

Name: Antique Print of the Siphonops Annulatus, the Ringed Caecilian
Brand: American Maps and Prints
SKU: BG-13214-13
Price: 180 USD
Availability: InStock

$180

€160 · dollar price at today's exchange rate

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

Date: 1861
Kind: Views & Engravings
Size: 15.3 × 23.4 cm (6 × 9.2 in)
Condition: Good. General age-related toning. Minor wear and soiling. With original protective sheet attached. Blank verso. Please study image carefully.
Reference: BG-13214-13

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

The ringed caecilian, Siphonops annulatus, a steel-gray engraving from the Dictionnaire universel d'histoire naturelle, edited by Charles Henry Dessalines d'Orbigny and published in 1861. The plate is headed "Dict. Univ. d'Hist. Nat." and "Reptiles", marked Pl. 14, and lettered "Ordre des Batraciens, Céciloïdes. Siphonops annelé (Siphonops annulatus, Wagl.)".

The legless animal lies curled in a wide C on bare ground at the center of the sheet, drawn in a glossy blue-black, with the pale rings that give it its name running along its body. Behind it, a stage-set landscape suggests the tropics: large agave plants at the right, palm-like foliage and a small hut at the left, and a bare hill on the horizon.

The siphonops is a caecilian in the family Siphonopidae, an amphibian of South America that lives underground and is often mistaken for a worm or snake.

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