Philip Miller Cactus Grandiflorus, Great night-flowering Cereus c1794

$495.00

Philip Miller, Great Night Flowering Cereus, Cactus grandiflora, 1794, J. Whatman watermarked paper.

Beautiful and rare original hand-coloured copperplate engraving for Philip Miller’s Gardener’s Dictionary, a much celebrated folio-size work, first published in 1731, and translated, copied, abridged, and republished eight times during Miller's lifetime.

Philip Miller (1691-1771) was the son of a Deptford nurseryman of Scottish descent, who ensured his son had a good education. He travelled extensively through England, Flanders and Holland, studying horticulture, gardening and agriculture. He established his own nursery in Southwark – until 1722 when he was appointed Head Gardener at the Chelsea Physic Garden.

English botanist Philip Miller F.R.S., succeeded his father as ‘gardener to the company of apothecaries of Chelsea’. From 1722 to 1771 Philip Miller was foreman of Chelsea Physic Garden, a botanical garden which had been set up in 1673, and belonged to the Society of Apothecaries of London. Greatly skilled in the cultivation of plants, during his time at Chelsea, Philip transformed this private garden of medicinal plants into the greatest botanical garden in Europe. Philip Miller was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his knowledge of living plants which was unequalled during his lifetime.

Size of page: 16 x 10 inches or 41 x 26cm