I Am Guessing Not Many Of Us Have Heard Of A Book Called,

Traité des couleurs servant à la peinture à l’eau,

it is not a book that you read or look at the pictures, it is a 800 page hand painted and written book published some 270 years ago by an author known only as A. Boogert, he sat down to write a book in Dutch about mixing watercolours, not only would he begin the book with a bit about the use of colour in painting, but would go on to explain how to create certain hues and change the tone by adding one, two, or three parts of water, the premise sounds simple enough, but the final product is almost unfathomable in its detail and scope,

it took until 1963 for a new edition if you like to be published, the the Pantone Colour Guide, which when used by publishers, artists and designers means that the colour chosen in one country can be faithfully reproduced in another, the book is currently kept at the Bibliothèque Méjanes in Aix-en-Provence, France, all 898 pages of it can be viewed here, but what a Herculean task to undertake and I guess it was the only one made, I wonder how many people at the time actually looked at it?