ORIGINS OF MODERNITY

natural history

Willughby, Francis (1635-1672)
De historia piscium libri quatuor…
Oxonii : e theatro Sheldoniano, 1686.

The cost of producing a magnificent volume such as Willughby's Historia priscium was substantial. This book was sponsored by the financially strapped Royal Society in the mid-1680s and it proved to be a financial burden to the Society, preventing the Society from publishing Newton's Principia. The plates were paid for by individual virtuosi. John Ray edited the posthumous volume and the Dean of Christ Church Oxford, John Fell, supervised its printing even though it was a Royal Society publication.