The hand-coloured plates featured here come from the 4th and last but one version of the first collective description of the birds of Denmark and Scandinavia.
Niels Kjærbølling, who was not a scientist, used Naumann's book on the birds of Germany plus his own collection of ca. 4,000 copies of taxidermy as models for the drawings, which he drew and lithographed himself.
The work was very popular from the beginning with an impression of ca. 500 copies. As a recognition of his work Kjærbølling was presented with the garden of Princess Wilhelmine in Frederiksberg, where he later the same year opened the Copenhagen Zoological Gardens.
Print sizes: 41 x 26 cm - 16 1/2 x 10 1/4 inches