London, Williams and Norgate, 1855. 8vo (22.1 x 14.3 cm). Title page, [i], 556 pp.; five lithographed and finely hand-coloured plates, tissue-guarded. Original blind-stamped pebbled cloth. Spine with gilt title.

A seldom-seen work by the British malacologist Sylvanus Charles Thorp Hanley (1819-1899). This work was a kind of a novelty: no previous malacologist had truly valued the importance of the original (type) material of Linnaeus. It took almost another hundred years before Dodge started his never-completed series on the same subject. Addition of the original texts forms a welcome addition. Provenance: armorial bookplate of the Radcliffe Library (Oxford) mounted on the front pastedown, with a decommission stamp of Bodleian Library (Oxford). Small stamp of the American malacologist Richard Irwin Johnson (1925-2020) in the top margin of the title page. Part of the lower spine a bit discoloured due to a former label; otherwise an excellent copy. Very uncommon. We have not had this work before. Pencilled, scholar marginalia in the introduction page margins. Small chip to spine top, otherwise very good, clean. Caprotti II, p. 30 (194); Soulsby, 112. Not in Nissen.