Annals of the Natal Museum – Vol. III, Part 3, May 1917 edited by Ernest Warren

A scarce original 1917 issue of Annals of the Natal Museum, Volume III, Part 3, edited by Ernest Warren, D.Sc. (Lond.), Director of the Natal Museum. Published in London by Adlard & Son & West Newman Ltd. and printed by order of the Trustees, this early scientific publication provides an important record of natural-history research undertaken in Natal and southern Africa during the early twentieth century.

A major feature of this issue is “The Plant Ecology of the Drakensberg Range” by J. W. Bews, Professor of Botany at Natal University College. Beginning on page 511, this substantial study is accompanied by Plates XXXVI–XXXIX and three text figures.

Other contributions to Annals of the Natal Museum cover the terrestrial Isopoda of Natal by Walter E. Collinge; South African bagworms and Psychidae, including papers by A. J. T. Janse, E. Meyrick and O. B. Hardenberg; and descriptions of new South African Arachnida by John Hewitt of the Albany Museum, Grahamstown.

Annals of the Natal Museum is an appealing and increasingly uncommon piece of early South African scientific publishing, particularly relevant to collectors of Africana, KwaZulu-Natal history, Drakensberg literature, South African botany, ecology, entomology, arachnology and natural-history publications.

Condition – Very Good

Very good 1917 paperback publication with moderate age-related shelf wear to the original printed wrappers. A small tear is present near the bottom of the front hinge, together with a small area of loss at the spine tail. Minor age marking and spotting are present. Overall, the publication remains well preserved.