Johann Elias Ridinger (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). Cheval d’Ostfriesland nomé la Grüe. The world’s most famous dapple-grey horse, the Crane at Oldenburg in East Frisia, with his master’s brand – A in 8-pointed star below crown – before thick oak foliage scenery. Colored etching with engraving after Jacob Theodor Klein. Inscribed: EQVVS Ostfris. / Der Kranich zu Oldenburg in Ost-Frießland. / as above / Familia I. Einhufige. / Ex Collection. J. Th. Kleinii Secr. Gedan. / J. E. Ridinger fecit et exc. Aug. Vindel. 12⅛ × 8 in (30.7 × 20.3 cm).

Thienemann & Schwarz 976; Niemeyer, Ridinger Erlebnisse 1698-2020, 2021, pp. 160 f. with full-size color ill. – IN THE RIDINGERS’ ORIGINAL COLORING from the unnumbered Colored Animal Kingdom created since 1754 and concluded finally posthumously not before 1773 (“Complete copies are next to untraceable”, so Weigel, Art Cat., sect. XXVIII, Ridinger Appendix 63a as merely 120-sheet torso, 1857 ! , but also just individual plates quite rarely on the market only, at niemeyer’s currently the one as the others all the same). – Remaining uncolored contrary to the prospectus, a second edition from the plates shortened even under loss of animals and with modified titling and the Ridinger inscription removed, yet now numbered, was published by Engelbrecht/Herzberg in Augsburg 1824/25.

With Jacob Theodor Klein (“Plinius Gedanensium”, Königsberg 1685 – Danzig 1759; town clerk in Danzig, co-founder and later director of the Danzig Society of Naturalists, member of the Royal Society, London, and honorary member of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg; ADB XVI, 92 ff.), famous for his collections, Ridinger was in close communication and supported in his Colored Animal Kingdom undertaking in many ways, too. Following Klein’s classification according to kind and number of extremities – superceded by Linné’s anatomical classification – the early states of some plates of the set still show references to his Quadrupedum Dispositio brevisque Historia Naturalis of 1751, as known to Thienemann for some plates and documented here for several more by a complete copy available here. Ridinger himself emphasizes by the preface in his words of thanks “in particular the tremendously beautiful collection of P(rofessor). Klein of the Ludolph estate, which comprises nothing but original items.”

and correspondingly announced by the master himself per page 11 of his preamble to the Animal Kingdom

“ … albeit the presentation of the singular white horse

with such a long tail and crest …

might seem almost incredible and exaggerated ,

the matter nevertheless is absolutely true as His Honor the famous professor Klein at Danzig himself has kindly communicated such representation. This splendid creature has been bred in East Frisia , raised there , and been named

the Crane at Oldenburg.

As far as is known to us one has almost never seen something like this, although it was reported to us that such a white tail is shown by an isabelline colored horse in the natural history collection in Dresden (taxidermied; destroyed by later fire) and that at Florence there has been such a black horse, too .”

Here then the indeed historical background, as according to an adaptation by Isabelle Yeginer on a homepage of the city of Oldenburg on occasion of journeys count Anthony Günther (1583-1667, since 1603 Imperial Count of Oldenburg and, from 1647, Delmenhorst), horse lover of degree –

(Joh. Frdr. L. Th. Merzdorf, ADB I [1875], p. 492, and Hermann Lübbing, NDB I [1953], p. 317 resp.) –

fell into the hands of counterfeiters in a haunted castle and escaped with his life only by promising absolute secrecy.

“ Years later one evening count Anthony Günther sat in his home castle at his desk when there was a knock … The (now well-dressed) visitor was one of the counterfeiters of that supposed haunted castle in Holstein. ‘You have kept your promise’ he said … ‘and disclosed nothing of what you had seen then. For this you shall be rewarded. In the Blue House at the Dam a noble horse is ready for you, which is worthy of you.’ … There he found the Crane,

the most beautiful horse he had ever laid eyes upon .

Still today, at the time of the Kramer Fair, count Anthony Günther is commemorated annually. Then he rides on his legendary Crane in front of the great Kramer Fair procession. ”

Watermarked Strasbourg fleur-de-lis above arms + C & I Honig (type Heawood 64/Churchill 428) as that sturdy Dutch quality paper Ridinger used in line with his preamble to the Principal Colors of Horses

“on account of the fine illumination” for the colored works

“as for this purpose it is the most decent and best”. – Margins on three sides 2-2.8 cm, below 5.2 cm wide. – Upper left in the white paper margin/platemark ¾ × 1⅝ in (2 × 4 cm) mould stain, otherwise isolated little brown spots in the white plate field and the white margin resp. only, the latter below right also with thumb stain.

Offer no. 15,871 | price on application

1. “famous work which the merited naturalist Jacob Theodor Klein in Danzig published 1751 under the title: Quadrupedum Dispositio brevisque Historia Naturalis. Enlarged and revised, he had translated it into the German himself and his friend Gottfried Reyger published it 1760 under the title: J. Th. Klein’s Natural Order and Augmented History of the Quadruped Animals. Ridinger was in close communication with Klein, was supported by him in many ways in this (Animal Kingdom) undertaking and followed Klein’s system” (Th., p. 200)↩