1823 Old-Colored Engraving - Gauchos Lassoing Cattle in Buenos Aires, Argentina
€ 110
Original antique · The actual sheet photographed · Certificate of authenticity on request · Sold unframed · Worldwide shipping from € 15 (rates)
Date
1823
Sheet size
19.5 × 23.5 cm (7.7 × 9.3 in)
Condition
Good
Reference
BG-13997-8
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
Condition report: Margins lightly toned, scattered foxing spots, hand-coloring well preserved, minor edge wear, no major damage or tears. Some light offsetting. Study the images carefully.
About this sheet
Gauchos at work outside Buenos Aires, an original hand-colored copper engraving of 1823 from Friedrich Johann Bertuch's Bilderbuch fuer Kinder (Picture Book for Children). The plate is lettered "Verm. Gegenstaende. CCLXV" at the upper left and "Melanges. CCLXV" at the upper right, the German and French headings of the Weimar publication.
In the foreground a gaucho on a chestnut horse swings a lasso over a cow that has gone down on its knees, while two white birds pick at the ground beside it. A second rider sits on a dark horse at the right, a woman in a patterned skirt and pink head cloth stands by a fence of upright stakes, and an ox-drawn cart with a covered body waits under the trees. Behind them the plain opens out to the cattle being slaughtered, and on the horizon the domes and towers of Buenos Aires stand in a pale haze beneath a wide blue sky.
Bertuch's picture book was issued in parts from 1790 to 1830 and ran to twelve volumes with nearly 1,200 plates on natural history, peoples and customs, so that a sheet like this one served as a lesson in how the cattle country of the River Plate was worked.
