Antique Print of Greenland Shark with Detail Views – Paris, circa 1845
€ 780
Original antique · The actual sheet photographed · Certificate of authenticity on request · Sold unframed · Worldwide shipping from € 15 (rates)
Date
1845
Sheet size
34 × 48.7 cm (13.4 × 19.2 in)
Condition
Good
Reference
BG-09916
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 to very good. Some light foxing is visible, mostly confined to the margins. The main image is clear and the colors remain strong. Plate mark is visible. No restoration or repairs.
About this sheet
The Greenland shark, an original hand-colored lithograph from the French scientific publication Voyage en Islande et au Groenland, published in Paris around 1845. The plate is lettered "Poissons Pl. 22" at the upper right and "Zoologie" at the top, with the title "La Leiche boréale" below the large figure.
The whole shark, in a soft brownish gray shading to a blue-gray belly, is drawn in profile at the lower part of the sheet, with its short rounded snout and small eye, and the pale gill slits and low fins. Above it three detail studies are set in a row and lettered A, B, C and D: the eye with its parasite attached at A, the rows of teeth of the upper and lower jaws at B and C, and a patch of the rough skin at D, colored in brown and blue. The names of the artist, the engraver and the printer (Langlumé) and the publisher's name Arthus Bertrand are set in the margins.
The shark is now called Somniosus microcephalus, and the plate comes from the zoology volumes of the voyage to Iceland and Greenland, a French government expedition of the late 1830s.
