5 volumes, imperial folio (552 x 368 mm). 367 fine hand-colored plates, most heightened with gum-arabic, by Gould, Henry Constantine Richter, Joseph Wolf and William Hart, printed by Walter or Walter & Cohn, 2 wood-engraved illustrations. (Some offsetting, spotting throughout, minor loss to upper portion of preliminary leaf to first volume.) Contemporary half morocco gilt, spines in 7 compartments with 6 raised bands, gilt-lettering in 2, others gilt, stamp-signed by Henry Sotheran & Co. (light rubbing to extremities, spines lightly sunned).

FIRST EDITION of "the most sumptuous and costly of British bird books" (Mullens and Swann). The Birds of Great Britain was originally issued in 25 parts over ten years and was entirely published by Gould himself, who would ultimately produce approximately 750 copies which were then issued for sale by London bookseller Henry Southeran & Co. Gould began work on The Birds of Great Britain in 1856 with an ornithological tour of Scandinavia with the artist Joseph Wolf, renowned for his great skill in accurately rendering wildlife in a variety of natural poses and settings.

Each lithograph was painstakingly colored by hand under Gould's direction, with Gould writing in the introduction that "every sky with its varied tints and every feather of each bird were coloured by hand; and when it is considered that nearly two hundred and eighty thousand illustrations in the present work have been so treated, it will most likely cause some astonishment to those who give the subject a thought." The lithograph stone used for the Snowy Owl illustration (vol. I, plate 34) was broken early in the printing process, but was mended and continued to be used in subsequent printings; the plate printed in the present copy is unbroken. The book was a great success and was seen, "perhaps partly because its subject was British, as the culmination of Gould's genius" (Isabella Tree, The Ruling Passion of John Gould, p. 207). Fine Bird Books, p.102; Nissen IVB 372; Sauer 23; Wood p.365; Zimmer p.261.