Claude Perrault (1613–1688)
Memoir’s [sic] for a natural history of animals, containing the anatomical descriptions of several creatures dissected by the Royal Academy of Sciences at Paris
London: J. Streater, 1688

Perrault’s History was an innovative study in which some fifty exotic animals were described in detail, with eye-witness accounts of dissections. The original 1671 French edition, a large format ‘elephant folio’, was extremely hard to obtain, so members of the Royal Society of London produced this translation. Moore owned a copy of the French edition; its immense size means it is too large to display here. A second volume was published in 1676, but Perrault’s death in 1688 (brought about by an infection contracted while dissecting a camel) meant that a projected third volume was never completed.

M.14.41, pp. 2–3 (Royal Library)