Buffon. Natural History. Birds, Volume V, 1785

This is the fifth volume on birds from the "Natural History, General and Particular" by the French naturalist Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon (1707–1788). Buffon worked on this multi-volume study from 1749 to 1788; it describes quadrupeds, birds and many other animals.

From 1739 Buffon directed the Royal Botanical Garden in Paris, and from then on the natural sciences became his main occupation. The finest edition of the "Natural History" is considered to be the Paris edition in 36 volumes, published in 1749–1788.

This copy was printed in 1785 not in Paris but in Deux-Ponts, the French name for the German town of Zweibrücken. The book is illustrated with etched engravings and bound in leather with gold tooling and gilding.