Cinnyris oustaleti / Anthreptes tephrolaema [Oustalet’s Sun-bird]

Description

original hand-colour lithograph, with accompanying text.

Exquisite print from Captain George Ernest Shelley’s landmark work A Monograph of the Nectariniidae or
Family of Sun-Birds. It depicts Oustalet’s Sunbird (Cinnyris oustaleti). Native to the high-altitude interior plateaus and dry montane woodlands of central and western Angola, as well as adjacent regions of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the species is recognized by the male’s metallic green head, blue-violet throat band, and warm yellow-to-orange belly highlights. Today, it can still be found inhabiting its native Angolan montane forest edges, savanna thickets, and scrublands, active amongst flowering flora. Illustrated by the master lithographer John Gerard Keulemans, whose careful field studies and attention to natural history allowed him to render the bird’s delicate plumage and surrounding foliage with exceptional realism, this artwork exemplifies the finest 19th century scientific illustration. Printed in a strictly limited subscriber run of only 250 copies, original first-edition plates from this monograph remain exceptionally scarce and valued by collectors today.