Fruit Moths with Caterpillar in a Cut Apple, Antique Bertuch Print, circa 1815

€ 185

Original antique · The actual sheet photographed · Certificate of authenticity on request · Sold unframed · Worldwide shipping from € 15 (rates)

Date: circa 1813-1818
Mapmaker / artist: Unknown engraver (engraver); after Friedrich Justin Bertuch (editor)
Publisher: B. Ph. Bauer, Vienna (attributed)
Technique: Copper Engraving
Coloring: Original hand color
Condition: Fair
Reference: BG-14336-89

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.

Condition

Good condition for its age. Light toning and faint show-through of text; vertical crease in the right margin and a small spot beside the apple. Please review the images for further condition details.

About this sheet

This hand colored copper engraving of small moths that damage fruit and plants, with a caterpillar tunnelling through a cut apple, comes from the later Vienna edition of Friedrich Justin Bertuch's Bilderbuch. The apple, sliced open to show the path eaten through its core, is the memorable image and very probably shows the codling moth, although the species are identified here by appearance only.

The heading reads Insecten LXXXVIII and Insectes LXXXVIII, and the mark at lower right reads XVIII.B.38. At the top a mass of larvae feeds in a woolly web above a cluster of eggs on a leaf, and around the apple are the moths at natural size and enlarged, together with their caterpillars and pupae, each stage lettered for the accompanying text.

The later volumes of the Vienna edition, published in Vienna under the title Bilderbuch zum Nutzen und Vergnügen der Jugend, continued the reprint of Friedrich Justin Bertuch's Weimar Bilderbuch fuer Kinder in volumes of fifty plates each, with German and French headings in place of the three languages of the earlier plates. The Weimar original, the great illustrated encyclopaedia for children issued by the Landes Industrie Comptoir from 1790 onwards, was followed subject for subject, and the plates were sold colored by hand. The small mark at the foot, giving the Vienna volume and plate number, is what distinguishes these sheets from the Weimar issue. As a copper engraving colored by hand for a teaching book, it combines scientific ambition with a direct, appealing clarity. This sheet comes from Vienna volume XVIII, which places it circa 1813 to 1818.

A plate like this suits a study, a library or a collection of early natural history, and it hangs well in a group with other Bertuch insect and microscope plates, where the variety of subjects and the consistent format of the series come into their own.

The sheet is in good condition for its age, with light toning, faint show-through of text, a vertical crease in the right margin and a small spot near the apple; the image is otherwise clean.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.