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)

9781108023030, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 25 November 2010

654 pages, 25 b/w illus.
21.6 x 3.7 x 14 cm, 0.82 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 6 covers parrots, parakeets and other foreign birds.

1. The fly-birds
2. The colibri
3. The parrot
4. The cockatoos
5. The parrots properly so called
6. The jaco, or cinereous parrot
7. The loris
8. Varieties of the noira
9. The collared lori
10. The parrakeet loris
11. Parrakeets of the old continent, in which the tail is long and equally tapered
12. Parrakeets of the old continent, which have a long and unequal tail
13. Short-tailed parrakeets of the old continent
14. Parrots of the new continent
15. The aras
16. The Amazons and cricks
17. The Amazon parrots
18. The yellow-headed Amazon
19. The tarabe, or red-headed Amazon
20. White-headed Amazon
21. Yellow Amazon
22. Aourou-couraou
23. Varieties of the aourou-couraou
24. The cricks
25. Varieties of the blue-headed crick
26. The violet-headed crick
27. The popinjays
28. The tavoua
29. The parroquets
30. Parroquets of the new continent, with long and equally tapered tails
31. The pavouane parroquet
32. Parroquets with a long tail unequally tapered
33. The cincialo
34. The touis, or short-tailed parroquets
35. The yellow-throated toui
36. The golden-headed toui
37. The curucuis
38. The Curucukoo
39. The touraco
40. The cuckoo
41. The anis
42. The houtou, or momot
43. The hoopoes, the promerops, and the bee-eaters
44. The European goat-sucker
45. The swallows
46. The martin
47. The sand martin
48. The crag swallow
49. The swift.

Subject Areas: Evolution [PSAJ]