Johann Elias Ridinger (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). The Great Black Bear. Tamed, with nose ring and head strap in slightly bent position to the right before a boulder on a sloping ledge. Colored etching with engraving. Inscribed: VRSVS, MAXIMVS NIGER. / Der große Schwarze Bär. / L’ours grand et noir. / Familia IV. Fünffzähige. / J. El. Ridinger fec. et excud. A.V. 12 × 8¼ in (30.5 × 20.8 cm).

Thienemann & Schwarz 1079. – 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 watermark C & I Honig 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 1.4-3.2 cm, below 5.4 cm wide. – Faint tidemark in the lower white plate/paper field and two faint (little) brown spots in the white plate field right.

Offer no. 15,928 | price on application