Finska Fogelägg / Eggs of Finnish Birds / Suomen Lintuin Munia

Pp. viii, xiii, x, ix, xvi (=56 total pages of text); 25 chromolithograph plates featuring a total of 234 individual figures of eggs.  Early full black morocco leather, spine with four raised bands that are gilt decorated and bordered by gilt panel lines, the title and author are lettered in gilt in the second compartment, front and rear covers bordered in gilt and with beveled edges, original color pictorial endpapers, (original pictorial front wrapper is bound in place) oblong folio (10 x 13.5 inches; 25 x 34 cm).  According to Casey Wood, McGill Library (p. 587): The work was issued in nine parts with 3 plates in each part of parts 1-7 and two in each of parts 8 and 9.  Parts 1 and 2 appeared in 1879 and parts 8 and 9 in 1888.  The text by J. A. Palmen was issued in parts I-V in German and Swedish, printed in parallel columns.  The figures on the plates are in Latin, Swedish and Finnish.  Zimmer Ayer Library (p. 611-12) lists this title but states that no text was present in their copy.  Anker, Bird Books (p. 201-202) lists the same collation as the Casey Wood collation presented above but states the text must have been interrupted after Part V by Palmen.  Anker also notes that this work is “the first chromo-lithographic atlas published in Finland.”  Without doubt this is a rare volume, especially when bound in a ‘fine binding’ as seen here.  No ownership marks and no signs of use.