Regensburg, Montags Erben, 1789. 8vo (18.5 x 12.1 cm). [42], 182 pp.; three nature-printed plates (one folding, one double folding). Later blind wrappers.

This is the very rare first edition of the scarce Botanisches Taschenbuch (later: Neues Botanisches Taschenbuch), published yearly between 1790 and 1811. Apparently intended as publication of Der Naturforschenden Gesellschaft in Halle. A peculiar aspect is the linking of all days of the year with the names of famous botanists. In the rear, three examples of nature prints are included. David Heinrich Hoppe (1760-1846) was a doctor, and pharmacist, and later Professor in Regensburg. He founded the Regensburgischen Botanischen Gesellschaft(the world's oldest still extant botanical society) and the botanical periodical Flora (1818 onwards). Hoppe published a similar Taschenbuch on insects. Both are very rare in any edition. He also wrote the Ectypa Plantarum Ratisbonensium, oder Abdrücke derjenigen Pflanzen, welche um Regensburg wild wachsen, being another book with early nature prints. In this copy his illustration of a tree leaf in nature printing is that of a beech; in a later, apparently far more common edition, this is replaced by the print of an oak leaf. Uncut, with the widest possible margins. Wrappers creased, some light foxing to the text, but in all a very good, complete copy. Fischer, 13; Pritzel, 4249.