
''Banks' Florilegium'' is a collection of
copperplate engraving
Engraving is the practice of incising a design on a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ar ...
s of plants collected by Sir
Joseph Banks
Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, (19 June 1820) was an English Natural history, naturalist, botanist, and patron of the natural sciences.
Banks made his name on the European and American voyages of scientific exploration, 1766 natural-history ...
and
Daniel Solander
Daniel Carlsson Solander or Daniel Charles Solander (19 February 1733 – 13 May 1782) was a Sweden, Swedish naturalist and an Apostles of Linnaeus, apostle of Carl Linnaeus.
Solander was the first university-educated scientist to set foot o ...
while they accompanied Captain
James Cook
Captain (Royal Navy), Captain James Cook (7 November 1728 – 14 February 1779) was a British Royal Navy officer, explorer, and cartographer famous for his three voyages of exploration to the Pacific and Southern Oceans, conducted between 176 ...
on his
first voyage around the world between 1768 and 1771. They collected plants in
Madeira
Madeira ( ; ), officially the Autonomous Region of Madeira (), is an autonomous Regions of Portugal, autonomous region of Portugal. It is an archipelago situated in the North Atlantic Ocean, in the region of Macaronesia, just under north of ...
,
Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
,
Tierra del Fuego
Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South America, South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan.
The archipelago consists of the main is ...
, the
Society Islands
The Society Islands ( , officially ; ) are an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean that includes the major islands of Tahiti, Mo'orea, Moorea, Raiatea, Bora Bora and Huahine. Politically, they are part of French Polynesia, an overseas country ...
,
New Zealand
New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...
,
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
and
Java
Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...
. During this voyage, Banks and Solander collected nearly 30,000 dried specimens, eventually leading to the description of 110 new
genera
Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...
and 1300 new species, which increased the known flora of the world by 25 per cent.
Banks's and Solander's specimens were studied aboard the
''Endeavour'' by the botanical illustrator
Sydney Parkinson
Sydney Parkinson ( 1745 – 26 January 1771) was a Scottish botanical illustrator and natural history artist. He was the first European artist to visit Australia, New Zealand and Tahiti. Parkinson was the first Quaker to visit New Zealand.
...
. He made 674 detailed drawings of each specimen with notes on their colour, and completed 269 watercolour illustrations before dying of
dysentery
Dysentery ( , ), historically known as the bloody flux, is a type of gastroenteritis that results in bloody diarrhea. Other symptoms may include fever, abdominal pain, and a feeling of incomplete defecation. Complications may include dehyd ...
after the ''Endeavour'' left
Batavia. When they returned to London in 1771, Banks employed five artists to create watercolours of all of Parkinson's drawings, and 18 engravers to create 743 copperplate
line engraving
Line engraving is a term for engraved images printed on paper to be used as prints or illustrations. The term is mainly used in connection with 18th- or 19th-century commercial illustrations for magazines and books or reproductions of paintings. ...
s from the completed watercolours at a considerable cost. The engraving work stalled in 1784, and the ''Florilegium'' was not printed in Banks's lifetime. On his death in 1820 he bequeathed the plates to the
British Museum
The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...
.
Some of the plates were eventually printed. Between 1900 and 1905,
James Britten
James Britten (3 May 1846 – 8 October 1924) was an English botanist.
Biography
Born in Chelsea, London, he moved to High Wycombe in 1865 to begin a medical career. However he became increasingly interested in botany, and began writing papers ...
and the British Museum issued prints of 315 of the plant engravings in black ink, under the title ''Illustrations of Australian Plants''. Others were included in black and white in the 1973 book ''Captain Cook's Florilegium''.
The first complete full-colour edition of the ''Florilegium'' was published between 1980 and 1990 in 34 parts by Alecto Historical Editions and the
Natural History Museum, London
The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum (Lo ...
. Only 100 sets were made available for sale, at a cost of about $100,000,
some on a subscription basis. The plates were printed using a 17th-century technique known as ''à la poupée'' where each colour was applied directly to the plate; colour accuracy was checked against Parkinson's notes and through consultation with the museum's Botanical Editor,
Chris Humphries
Christopher J. Humphries FLS (Derby, 29 April 1947 – 31 July 2009) was a British botanist known for his work on systematic botany and biogeography.
In 1980, he was awarded the Bicentenary Medal of the Linnean Society. In 2001 the Linnean Soc ...
. Each plate took from one week to two months to proof. Chris Humphries worked closely with his colleague, the Botany Librarian
Judith Diment, as well as the printers led by Edward Egerton-Williams, the typesetters led by Ian Mortimer and colleagues at Alecto Historical Editions including Nigel Frith, Laurence Hoffman and Elaine Shaughnessy. Parts 1 to 15 consist of 337 plates relating to the
Australian flora, parts 16 to 34 include Brazil, Madeira, New Zealand, Java, Society Islands and Tierra del Fuego. ''Banks’ Florilegium'' is the world's largest 20th-century fine art printing project, and has been exhibited all over the world.
The Alecto Historical edition of ''Banks' Florilegium'' was purchased in Australia by the
State Library of Victoria
State Library Victoria (SLV) is the state library of Victoria, Australia. Located in Melbourne, it was established in 1854 as the Melbourne Public Library, making it Australia's oldest public library and one of the first free libraries in th ...
,
the
State Library of New South Wales
The State Library of New South Wales, part of which is known as the Mitchell Library, is a large heritage-listed special collections, reference and research library open to the public and is one of the oldest libraries in Australia. Establis ...
, and the
State Library of Queensland
State Library of Queensland (State Library) is the state public reference and research library of Queensland, Australia, operated by the Government of Queensland, state government. The Library is governed by the Library Board of Queensland, whi ...
.
A selection of 147 of the plates was printed at three-quarter scale by
Thames & Hudson
Thames & Hudson (sometimes T&H for brevity) is a publisher of illustrated books in all visually creative categories: art, architecture, design, photography, fashion, film, and the performing arts. It also publishes books on archaeology, history, ...
in 2018 as ''Joseph Banks' Florilegium'', with commentaries by botanist
David Mabberley
Professor David John Mabberley , (born May 1948) is a British botanist, educator and writer. Among his varied scientific interests is the taxonomy of tropical plants, especially trees of the families Labiatae, Meliaceae and Rutaceae (in parti ...
and essays by art historian Mel Gooding.
A documentary recounting the journey and the publication of the Florilegium, ''Banks' Florilegium: The Flowering of the Pacific'', was released in 1984. It was narrated by Australian
Robert Hughes. A book on the subject, ''The flowering of the Pacific: Being an account of Joseph Banks' travels in the South Seas and the story of his Florilegium'' by Brian Adams, was published by the British Museum in 1986. A television mini-series ''The Lost World of Joseph Banks'' (2016) explored Banks's life and influence over five episodes.
References
Endeavour's Scientific Impact (1768 - 1771)The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations
*
*
External links
Each plate by speciesAlecto Historical Editions - Banks' FlorilegiumLarner, Stacey. The grand florilegiums of Joseph Banks and Ferdinand Bauer [blog post, 28 October 2021/nowiki>">log post, 28 October 2021">
Larner, Stacey. The grand florilegiums of Joseph Banks and Ferdinand Bauer [blog post, 28 October 2021
/nowiki> State Library of Queensland
State Library of Queensland (State Library) is the state public reference and research library of Queensland, Australia, operated by the Government of Queensland, state government. The Library is governed by the Library Board of Queensland, whi ...
{{Authority control
Botany books
Botany in Australia
Books about Australian natural history
Fine illustrated books