Category: Astronomy

[HOOKE. Robert, ed.]

HOOKE’S RARE CONTINUATION OF THE TRANSACTIONS

[HOOKE. Robert, ed.] Philosophical Collections

London, Printed for John Martyn, [Moses Pitt, Richard Chiswell], for the Royal Society, 1679-82.

£20000

FIRST EDITION. Compete set of 7 parts in one volume, 210 pp., 6 folding plates, one full-page engraving (no. 5, p. 161), one half-page engraving (no. 4, p. 92), Bound in modern half calf and buckram over boards by Sangorsky & Sutcliffe. A fine copy. 

The polymath Robert Hooke (1635-1703) was authorised by the Council of the Royal Society to publish the Philosophical Collections after the official Transactions ceased publication on Henry Odenburg’s death in 1677. Ordinary publication of the Transactions was resumed in January 1682- 3. The purpose of the journal was to provide an up-to-date account of any sicientific topic, such as physical, anatomical, chemical, mechanical, astronomical, optical, natural-philosophical and natural-historical observations, and to advertise the publication of such books. Complete sets of these seven numbers are very uncommon. The present volume also includes anatomical and medical studies. Hooke here published important papers, especailly An optical discourse, which concerned a cure for short-sightedness. One finds in the present collection Leeuwenhoek’s discovery of spermatozoa through the study of animal semen; Lana’s “flying chariot”; Borelli’s De motu musculorum; Tyson’s Anatomy of a porpess (sic); and astronomical observations by Hevelius, Flamsteed, and Cassini on the eclipse of Jupiter by the moon in 1679 and 1681. Furthermore, major discoveries by Malpighi, Moxon, Thomas Burnett, Edmund Halley, Bernoulli, and Leibniz are published in this series for the first time. The plates show Bernier’s flying machine, Borelli’s underwater breathing apparatus, and a new lamp invented by Robert Boyle. William Brigg’s A new theory of vision, a discussion of the optic nerves, is accompanied by a plate illustrating a dissected eye; this detailed physiological study of vision motivated Newton to republish it in 1685 with his own introduction. The Royal Society, founded in 1660, is the oldest scientific society in Great Britain and one of the oldest in Europe. Founders and early members included the scientist Bishop John Wilkins, the philosopher Joseph Glanvill, the mathematician John Wallis and the architect Christopher Wren, who wrote the preamble of its charter.

Keynes, Hooke 24. Norman 1100 (listing only 3 folding plates). See PMM 148 for the ‘Philosophical Transactions’.

CATTANEO, Giovanni Battista

CATTANEO, Giovanni Battista. Tavole nuove a modo di almanaco, per trovare con il giuoco di tre dadi perpetuamente il far della luna, le feste mobili, la lettera dominicale, l’aureo numero, il ciclo solare, l’indittione, et l’epatta; con molt’altre cose utili, e necessarie alla giornata, come nella tavola si vede. Opera degna, et talmente capace che ogni persona se ne potrà comodamente servire.

Brescia, Appresso Tomaso Bozzola (colophon: Vincenzo di Sabbio for Bozzola), 1566.

£5000

FIRST AND ONLY EDITION. Folio. *4 A-G6, ff. [iv] 42. Roman and Italic letter. T-p with nice woodcut vignette of a gryphon, holding a platen press and a winged sphere hanging from a chain, within an armorial shield decorated with masks at extremities and satires at sides, topped by two putti holding garlands which flank the composition; elaborated headpiece to preface, probably illustrating the imposing coat of arms of the Counts of Porcia e Brugnara between the figure of a knight, to the left, and a lady looking in a mirror, to the right (most likely representing Silvio and Camilla di Porcia e Brugnara, to whom this work is dedicated); small historiated initials, each numbered leaf with tables on both sides. Some light soiling, corners of two leaves skilfully repaired (no loss of text), bound in early vellum over boards with ink title and date to spine.

This is the first and only edition of this curious astrological work, which the author defines as a three-dice game provided of several tables, which allows one to read and foresee the cycle of the moon, and to compute and established the dates of the moveable feasts, the dominical letter, the golden ratio, the solar cycle, and the epact in order to determine the exact recurrence of Easter.

 Giambattista Cattaneo was an astrologer from Novara (now Piedmont). He was son to Girolamo, the famous Renaissance military architect and theoriser of techniques of war in the service of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, who chose the then Venetian city of Brescia as his home of choice.

Adams C 1017; INAUR (Cattaneo, Giovanni Battista); NUC (Cataneo, G.B.). Riccardi I 511: “Raro”. Not in BM STC Italian.