SCHEUCHZER (Johann Jacob). Physica sacra... Iconibus Æneis illustrata procurante & sumtus suppeditante Johanne Andrea Pfeffel. Augsburg, Ulm, 1731-1735. - 4 volumes in-folio, 442 x 298: frontispiece, (18 ff.), 2 portraits, 272 pp., 228 plates; (1 f.), pp. 273-514, 191 plates; (1 f.), pp. 515-1054, 183 plates; (1 f.), pp. 1055-1536, (48 ff.), 156 plates. Red morocco, triple gilt fillet framing the boards, ornate spine, gilt border inside, gilt edges (period binding). First Latin edition of this emblematic book, one of the most beautiful produced in Augsburg in the 18th century. This work was first published in German and Latin, then in French between 1732 and 1737. It is the work of Johann Jacob Scheuchzer (1672-1733), a medical doctor, botanist and professor of surgery in Zurich, considered one of the founders of paleontology and paleobotany. He offers a true sacred natural history, reconciling modern scientific knowledge with the knowledge revealed by the sacred text. The edition is remarkable for its rich illustration, including a frontispiece engraved by Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) after Johann Daniel Preisler (1666-1737), a portrait of the author engraved in the black manner by Tobias Laub (1685?-1761) after Johann Ulrich Heidegger (1700-1747), a portrait of the engraver Johann Andreas Pfeffel (1674-1748) engraved by Johann Georg Pintz (1697-1768?) and above all 758 plates of which five on double page and one in color (n° 66), drawn by the painter Johann-Melchior Füssli (1677-1736) and engraved under the supervision of Pfeffel by some of the best engravers of the time, such as Martin Tyroff (1704-1758), Georg Daniel Heumann (1691-1759), Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777), Johann Georg Pintz, Johann Daniel Herz (1693-1754), Johann August Corvinus (1683-1738), Jacob Andreas Fridrich (1684-1751), etc. The fourth volume includes a bookplate with the handwritten mention "Madame d'Étioles" surrounding a woodcut cartouche with the mention "Versailles". Madame d'Étiolles was none other than the future Marquise de Pompadour (1721-1764), favorite of King Louis XV. Very few copies are known to bear this bookplate, which in all likelihood was only added to a few books belonging to her in 1745 when she moved to Versailles and before she became the Marquise de Pompadour, hence the absence of her famous arms on the boards. The copy does not appear in the catalog of the sale of her library, where only the French edition of 1732 can be found (sale 1765, n° 19). The copy later entered the collection of Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex (1773-1843), sixth son of King George III and an eminent bibliophile, whose library of more than 50,000 volumes was dispersed in 6 sales and 14,107 lots between July 1844 and August 1845. The First Volume originally included clasps or more likely ties. They have since been removed and traces of their placement have been restored. Crack and restoration on the bottom hinge of the second volume's second cover. Tears to the flyleaf of the second volume. Bends to the frontispiece. Tears without missing restored in the margin of plate 23, in the margin of page 65 in the first volume and in the margin of leaf Gggggggg1 in volume 3. Light staining in the lower margin of plates 47, 48, 49 and 70. Provenance: Madame de Pompadour, with bookplate. - Augusts Frederick, Duke of Sussex, with armorial bookplate bearing the motto " Si Deus pro nobis, quis contra nos " (I, 1844, n° 3651).