Albertus Seba (1665-1736) is best known for the ‘Locupletissimi Rerum Naturalium Thesauri’ with these unusual plates. It is styled as a museum on paper recording the ‘cabinet of curiosities’ which was popular in the eighteenth century. An apothecary by training, Seba sold his first ‘Cabinet’ to Peter the Great in 1717 for 15,000 Dutch guilders. The rest of his life was spent building a second which was dispersed to pay for the remainder of this book at his death. His collections are recognised as being some of the finest ever built. Being based in Amsterdam gave him a wonderful opportunity to acquire unusual specimens of nature from around the world. Anker (1979) 454; ‘Fine Bird Books’ (1990) 106; Landwehr (1976) 179; Nissen BBI (1966) 1825; Nissen ZBI (1978) 3793; Plesch (1975-76) 862.