Prior to the proliferation of photography-based reference guides,naturalists and scientists relied on elaborate taxonomic descriptions to identify flora and fauna. One of those invaluable materials was Werner’s Nomenclature of Colours, a universal catalog originally arranged by German geologist Abraham Gottlob Werner in 1814 and updated with more detail by Patrick Syme just a few years later.
The wealthy volume, and which was the preeminent guide for artists,zoologists, botanists, or others working with pigments and the natural world throughout the 19th Century,is filled with hundreds of simple swatches and notes on where the various shades can be found around the globe. More
Source: thisiscolossal.com