Forest Doves, Geotrygon Rufiventris (Lawrence). J.Smit lithograph c1878.

by Smit, Joseph

Pair of doves, also known as Quail Doves - from Central America (as well as southern Mexico and West Indies, South America, and sometimes southern North America).

Original hand-coloured lithograph by Joseph Smit for ornithologist George Dawson Rowley’s Ornithological Miscellany published in London between 1875 and 1878. Dutch natural history artist, Joseph Smit (1836-1929) received his first commission to lithograph birds of the Dutch East Indies for Hermann Schlegel at the Leiden Museum. He showed great skill - particularly in representing their downy plumage, and was invited to London by Philip Sclater to do lithographs of new and rare species of American birds for Sclater's Exotic Ornithology in 1866. Joseph Smit became one of the finest lithographers of wildlife, and remained in London where he was much in demand during the most important period of grand illustrated natural history publications.

Page size 315 x 250mm (approximately 12.5 x 10 inches).