The Natural History of Birds
From the French of the Count de Buffon; Illustrated with Engravings, and a Preface, Notes, and Additions, by the Translator

The first comprehensive accounts of eighteenth-century ornithology, first published between 1770 and 1783 and translated into English in 1793.

Georges Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (Author), William Smellie (Edited and translated by)

9781108023009, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 25 November 2010

534 pages, 31 b/w illus.
21.6 x 3 x 14 cm, 0.67 kg

Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707–88), was a French mathematician who was considered one of the leading naturalists of the Enlightenment. An acquaintance of Voltaire and other intellectuals, he worked as Keeper at the Jardin du Roi from 1739, and this inspired him to research and publish a vast encyclopaedia and survey of natural history, the ground-breaking Histoire Naturelle, which he published in forty-four volumes between 1749 and 1804. These volumes, first published between 1770 and 1783 and translated into English in 1793, contain Buffon's survey and descriptions of birds from the Histoire Naturelle. Based on recorded observations of birds both in France and in other countries, these volumes provide detailed descriptions of various bird species, their habitats and behaviours and were the first publications to present a comprehensive account of eighteenth-century ornithology. Volume 3 covers corvids, thrushes and some tropical birds.

1. The red-legged crow
2. The hermit crow
3. The raven
4. The jackdaws
5. The alpine daw
6. The magpie
7. The jay
8. The nutcracker
9. The rollers
10. The Chinese roll
11. The grivert, or Cayenne rolle
12. The garrulous roller
13. Variety of rollers
14. The greater bird of paradise
15. The manucode
16. The magnificent bird of paradise
17. The black manucode of New Guinea, called the superb
18. The sifilet, or manucode with six filaments
19. The calybe of New Guinea
20. The ox-pecker
21. The common stare
22. Varieties of the stare
23. The troupiales
24. The troupiale
25. The aeolchi of Seba
26. The ring-tailed oriole
27. The japacani
28. The xochotol and the costotol
29. The tocolin
30. The commander
31. The black troupiale
32. The little black troupiale
33. The black-capped troupiale
34. The spotted troupiale of Cayenne
35. The olive troupiale of Cayenne
36. The weaver oriole
37. The whistler
38. The baltimore
39. The bastard baltimore
40. The yellow caffique of Brazil, or the yapou
41. Variety of the yapou
42. The carouge
43. The lesser bonana
44. The yellow-headed oriole
45. The olive carouge of Louisiana
46. The kink
47. The loriot
48. Varieties of the loriot
49. The thrushes
50. The throstle
51. Variety of the missel thrush
52. The fieldfare
53. Variety of the fieldfare
54. The mocking birds
55. The blackbird
56. The ring ouzel
57. Varieties of the ring ouzel
58. The rose-coloured ouzel
59. The rock blackbird
60. The blue ouzel
61. The solitary ouzel
60. The grisin of Cayenne
61. The verdin of Cochin China
62. The azurin
63. The short tail
64. The mainate of the East-Indies
65. The goulin
66. The paradise Grakle
67. The chatterer
68. The grosbeak
69. The crossbill
70. The house sparrow
71. The tree sparrow
72. The ring sparrow.

Subject Areas: Evolution [PSAJ]