{"title":"Fourteen books on observation and invention","description":"\u003cp\u003eFourteen books printed between 1591 and 1868. The books range across astronomy, Egypt, natural history, the history of the book and of collecting, machines and pyrotechnics, and medicine.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"traicte-du-tabac-johann-neander-1626","title":"Traicté du Tabac, ou Nicotiane, Panacée, Pétun: Autrement Herbe à la Reyne","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eAvec sa préparation \u0026amp; son usage, pour le plus part des indispositions du corps humain, ensemble les diverses façons de le falsifier, \u0026amp; les marques pour le recognoistrè: Composé premierement en Latin par Iean Neander, Médecin à Leyden (...). 1626 2nd Edition Treatise on Tobacco, or Nicotiana, the Universal Remedy, called also Petun, or the Queen’s Herb. Containing its preparation and use for most ailments of the human body, together with the different ways it may be adulterated (...). Pp. [1] f.e., [8], 342, [2], [1] r.e.; 9 total engraved plates of which [7] outside the numeration and 2 within it. Woodcut ornament on the title page, woodcut initials and decorations. Rebacked in old full parchment with (discolored) title at the spine; endpapers renewed in modern times. A slight peculiarity is perceptible in the frontispiece’s impression and paper, though not in a way that allows any firm conclusion. While a restoration or an anastatic replacement on old paper cannot be ruled out, there is no definite evidence for it. Consultations with a few colleagues did not yield agreement. Regardless, the volume is overall uniform and attractive, with charming fresh plates. Reference: Graesse IV, 652; Waring II, 709; Ferchl 379; Leclerc, Bibliotheca Americana , 407; Sabine XII, 576. 7 x 4 1\/5 x 1 French Tobacco as a miracle herb, with images of Native American traditional knowledge, Persian pipes recorded in a Western book for the first time, and botanical beauties. Second emission of the first French translation by Jacques Veyras (the first emission was issued only a few months before, in October 1625, and it is extremely rare, being its most recent sale recorded on Rare Book Hub from 1977). The first absolute Latin edition was printed in 1622 and it is apparently less pursued than the French one(s). The book presents a study of tobacco and its medicinal applications, firmly rejecting its use only for mere pleasure and insisting on its medical benefits. Its illustrative content, consisting of nine plates in total, features botanical plates, extremely rare images of Native Americans cultivating and curing tobacco, alongside some of the first depictions of long pipes and the Persian kalian (basically a hookah, or shisha, or narghile). This second Lyon printing retains a splendid series of engraved plates, among the earliest European depictions of tobacco and its worldwide culture. The images, executed in the clear, linear style characteristic of early scientific illustration, blend the instructional clarity of a herbal with the inquisitiveness of an ethnographic record. They are conventionally attributed to Moses van Uyttenbroeck, though the French imprint does not name the artist. The first 3 charming botanical plates include “Tabac mâle” and “Tabac femelle,” rendered as botanical portraits accompanied by verses beneath each figure. They are followed by 3 especially notable scenes portraying Native Americans cultivating and curing tobacco, showing the successive stages of cultivation, drying, and preparation of the leaves, with meticulous detail of the tools, baskets, and fermentation setups employed. The final 3 engravings, again particularly remarkable, present the Persian kalian together with various pipes, representing one of the earliest printed portrayals of such instruments in Central Europe. The engraver’s technique, sharp in outline, softly shaded, and marked by a touch of naivete, imbues the series with a distinctly 17th-century atmosphere, part scientific treatise, part decorative art. After a dedication by the printer, the text begins with the translator Veyras’s address “Au Lecteur,” followed by Neander’s structured chapters on the names and origins of tobacco, its various types and qualities, the proper seasons for planting and harvest, and the detailed preparation method known as 'Caldo' (p. 26 and following), a medical potion based on fermented drink, ginger powder, and other spices. The resulting product was stored in closed containers, and tobacco leaves could be dipped in it to obtain a special “vigor”. Subsequent sections outline tobacco's properties as a medicinal herb, antidote, and universal remedy, enriched with anecdotes from the Americas, Europe and Middle East. In fact, Neander was firmly against the recreational use of tobacco, viewing habitual consumption as both physiologically harmful and socially risky, much like alcohol. He endorsed its use solely for medical purposes, including the treatment of wounds, ulcers, and various other ailments. He even recommended tobacco as an eye remedy, claiming it could restore sharp vision in elderly patients. He regarded tobacco as a remedy for almost any non-fatal disease, attributing to the tobacco plant amazing qualities, to a point to name it “divine herb” and “holy grass”. Neander highlighted the countrymen’s leading role in bringing tobacco from the Americas and advised the use of long pipes (like the Persona and Native American ones) to let the smoke cool before inhalation. The text goes on presenting recipes to treat headaches, coughs, asthma, gout, constipation, stones, ulcers, birth pains, etc. In short, tobacco was experienced as a real remedy. Jean Neander (1596-1630), physician and botanist from Bremen (Germany), but also also a philosopher, writer and poet. He devoted much of his work to exploring the medicinal qualities of plants, especially tobacco. Flirtatious Tabac mâle and Tabac femelle, Native Americans expertly cultivating and curing leaves, and exotic Persian pipes making their European debut. Neander, ever the serious physician, shuns recreational puffing, praising tobacco as a miracle herb for nearly every non-fatal ailment. Sprinkled with recipes, anecdotes from three continents, and illustrations that charm with naïve precision, this book is a fascinating fusion of Native American knowledge and European medical knowledge (or imagination?), a jewel for collectors and dreamers alike.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria LLC","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47138687353067,"sku":"66-1626--2800-892-2025","price":2800.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/066_008.jpg?v=1771135690"},{"product_id":"le-cabinet-de-sainte-genevieve-molinet-ertinger-1692","title":"Le Cabinet de la Bibliotheque de Sainte Genevieve","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eDivisé en deux parties. Contenant les antiquitez de la réligion des Chrétiens, des Egyptiens, \u0026amp; des Romains. (...) Des Animaux les plus rares (...), des Coquilles (...), des Fruit etrangers (...) 1692 First Edition The Cabinet of the Library of Saint Geneviève [1] frontispiece; [1] title-page; [1] Molinet's portrait. Pp. [6], 224, [8]; 45 table plates outside the pagination, including 4 double-page plates. Contemporary vellum, minor staining; inner hinge of the front cover slightly damaged, but solid. Ownership signature and very small stamp at the title page. 2 frontispieces, portrait of Molinet, and 45 plates, all fresh and crisp, with very wide margins. An excellent, well-preserved copy with superb and richly detailed engravings. Reference: Nissen ZBI 2861; Tchmerzine Livres figurés du XVII Siècle p. 143. 16 1\/2 x 11 x 1 3\/4 French Forty-five plates to document one of the first museums and libraries, still shimmering with Baroque wunderkammer flair. A sumptuous and richly illustrated description of the Cabinet de curiosités and library of the Abbey of Sainte Geneviève in Paris; founded n the 6th century, it was one of the earliest Parisian cabinets that blended erudition, material culture, and library practice, placing Sainte-Geneviève among the great centers of learning before the Revolution. It is today across the square from the Panthéon, administered by La Sorbonne. During the Mediaeval ages the Library was already famous throughout Europe; after some difficult times during the Wars of Religions, the library was brought back to life beginning in 1619, during the reign of Louis XIII, by Cardinal Francois de Rochefoucauld, who donated six hundred volumes from his personal collection. In 1673, Claude Du Molinet became librarian and founded a small museum, the Cabinet of Curiosities, with Egyptian, Greek and Roman antiquities, medals, rare minerals and stuffed animals, within the library. By 1687 the library possessed twenty thousand books, and four hundred manuscripts. This volume, curated by Du Molinet himself, represents one of the most important testimonies to early modern collecting and the origins of museography. The first part of the volume is devoted to antiquities, while the second focuses on natural history. It presents a comprehensive survey of the abbey’s holdings. The plates, engraved in fine taille-douce by Franz Ertinger, depict the grand library and its cabinets filled with rare birds, fossils, coral branches, medals, engraved stones, minerals, and other marvels. The preface emphasizes the collection’s demonstrative, pedagogical, and scientific purpose, with several objects originating from the celebrated collection of the scholar Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc. Through its rigorous organization and didactic presentation, this work stands as a milestone in the history of collecting and museum studies. The Cabinet de la Bibliothèque de Sainte-Geneviève is one of the most visually sumptuous monuments of early modern scholarship. Its engravings by Franz Ertinger form a veritable museum on paper, chronicling the breadth of human curiosity at the end of the seventeenth century. Each image, both scientific and poetic, reveals the meticulous arrangement of Claude Du Molinet’s cabinet de curiosités, a harmonious dialogue between art, faith, and natural philosophy. Among the most impressive plates, the first seven (many in double-page format) offer panoramic views of the library and museum as they appeared: breathtaking galleries lined with bookshelves; cabinets of antiquities, specimens, and curiosities; every object placed with intention, every species rendered with accuracy and grace, reflecting both scientific observation and Baroque wonder. A total of forty-five copperplate engravings methodically explains the collections of Sainte-Geneviève, including medals and hundreds of ancient coins; antiquities and religious objects; exotic marvels such as a lizard from Brazil, the horns of rhinoceros, giraffe, and “unicorn,” a mandrake root shaped like a human figure, a so-called “mermaid’s hand,” and fossilized shells and corals, together with rare birds, fish, shells, and coral branches. Each plate is both an artwork and an intellectual map, a microcosm of the universal order Molinet sought to represent. Claude Du Molinet (1620-1687). French historian, antiquarian, and librarian, especially renowned for his historical and numismatic knowledge. He was the official librarian of the Abbey of Sainte-Geneviève from 1675 to 1687; he published a few works, but left above all a large number of manuscripts, most of which are currently kept in the reserve collection of the Sainte-Geneviève library. His masterpiece, The Cabinet of the Library of Sainte Geneviève, is a landmark work documenting one of the earliest museums of art, nature, and science, uniting faith and curiosity in the Baroque age. A paper museum of Baroque wonder? Yes please. Molinet’s cabinet turns curiosity into museography: unicorn horns, mandrakes, strange birds and fish, Egyptian relics, classical ruins, fossils, and minerals all staged with theatrical poise - and with the same earnest seriousness. A seventeenth-century world tour in engravings, plus a few enchanting panoramic views of a four-centuries-old library: we can't resist.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria LLC","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47138687451371,"sku":"69-1692--5800-3046-2025","price":5800.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/069_010_41999057-fd2b-4324-b92c-0ac5719e5422.jpg?v=1764641468"},{"product_id":"der-selbstlehrende-feuerwerker-c-blondel-1816","title":"Der selbstlehrende Feuerwerker","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eOder gründliche Anweisung zur Luftfeuerwerkskunst für Liebhaber (...) 1816 Second edition The Self-Teaching Fireworker, or Thorough Instruction in the Art of Recreational Fireworks for Enthusiasts (...) Pp. [1] f.e., XIV, 190, V folded plates, [1] r.e. Second half of quire R2 unopened. Original publisher mute hardcover paper boards, lightly soiled; handwritten library label at teh front cover; discolored spine. Internally in very good condition, plates clean and sharp, with strong impressions. A complete and attractive copy. 7 1\/4 x 4 1\/4 x 3\/4 German A sparkling fusion of chemistry and theatre in a rare fireworks manual. A work of both technical substance and ceremonial imagination, Blondel’s manual captures the moment when pyrotechnics shifted from guild tradition to scientific craft, and from improvised festivities to carefully designed theatrical environments. Conceived as a self-instruction manual, it bridges artisanal practice, chemical understanding, and festive design, offering the amateur and professional fireworker alike a coherent system for constructing rockets, wheels, fountains, and scenic displays. Blondel also preserves the intellectual lineage of his craft by including a rare historical bibliography of works on fireworks and artillery from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries (pp. X-XIV). Equally revealing is the author’s attention to ephemeral architecture. Since the seventeenth century, “fiery letters” were incorporated into Namensfahnen, illuminated name flagpoles bearing the initials or arms of those honored in public celebrations. Blondel preferred the elegant curves of the Romana rotunda script for such displays. By the eighteenth century, rising costs prompted fireworkers to design reusable scenic structures: sturdier frameworks, modular components, and papier-mâché ornaments that could be recombined for different occasions. Blondel advocates precisely such a repertory, encouraging builders to maintain stocks of prefabricated architectural elements (columns, arches, trophies, arms, reliefs) thus uniting economy, spectacle, and artistic flexibility. Blondel’s manual unfolds as a complete system of pyrotechnic instruction, uniting chemistry, mechanics, and festive design into a coherent whole. The text opens with detailed explanations of the fundamental materials of fireworks (saltpeter, sulfur, metallic powders) and proceeds to give precise recipes for producing flames in various colors, from the classic white and red to more delicate blues and greens. Blondel is meticulous in outlining methods for mixing, pressing, and safely loading such compositions, always attentive to the balance of power and finesse required to produce reliable effects. From these foundations he moves to the construction of specific devices: rockets of different calibers, Roman candles, fire pots, fountains, and the elaborate wheels and scenic mechanisms that animated public celebrations. This textual instruction finds its visual counterpart in the five large folding copperplates that accompany the volume, each transforming Blondel’s methods into clear, instructive diagrams. The first plate presents the essential instruments of rocket manufacture arranged with precise proportional measurements, effectively providing a scale model of the workshop itself. The second plate turns to the craftsman at work, showing the filling and mounting of rockets, the racks that steady them, and various mechanical arrangements. More complex ground-based structures appear in the third plate. The fourth and fifth plate shift from mechanics to spectacle, illustrating pyrotechnic wheels, cross-shaped constructions, geometric fire wheels, and scenographic composition of the letter \"A\". Taken together, the text and plates form a comprehensive manual of early nineteenth-century pyrotechnics, remarkable for its clarity, ambition, and the seamless interplay between scientific precision and theatrical imagination. Fireworks mean celebration! This rare practical showbook, where chemistry meets theatre, captures that spirit, its folding plates, lucid recipes, and curious machines making this \"explosive\" manual a small triumph of science that sparkles.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria LLC","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47138687615211,"sku":"74-1816--400-246-2025","price":450.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/074_013.jpg?v=1764544747"},{"product_id":"frezier-traite-feux-artifice-1747","title":"Traitè des feux d'artifice pour le spectacle","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis expanded and revised edition of Frézier’s treatise represents the most complete and practically oriented study of artificial fireworks produced in the early modern period. First issued in 1706 with a smaller suite of plates, the work was substantially reworked after the appearance of an unauthorized edition printed at The Hague in 1741 by Jean Neaulme. Prompted by this pirated version, Frézier prepared the present corrected and augmented edition, refining the text and enlarging its scope. Far from a purely military manual, the treatise marks a decisive shift toward fireworks as an art of spectacle and public celebration. While grounded in technical precision, it addresses fireworks as instruments of wonder, ceremony, and civic display. Contemporary commentators rightly noted Frézier’s breadth of expertise: a military engineer responsible for fortifications in the Caribbean, he nonetheless produced a work that treats recreational pyrotechnics with unprecedented seriousness and clarity. The result is a landmark text that helped redefine fireworks from tools of war into vehicles of artistic and theatrical expression.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47811296067819,"sku":"92-1747--1050-680-2025","price":1050.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/0092_IMG_68221.jpg?v=1771034674"},{"product_id":"bockler-theatrum-machinarum-1661","title":"Theatrum Machinarum Novum","description":"\u003cp\u003eDas ist: Neu-vermehrter Schauplatz der mechanischen Kunsten, Handelt von Allerhand- Wasser- Wind- Ross- Gewicht- und Hand-Muhlen Wie dieselbige zu dem Frucht-Mahlen\/ Papyr- Pulver- Stampff- Segen- Bohren- Walcken- Mangen und dergleichen anzuordnen. New Theater of Machines, i.e. Newly Enlarged Survey of the Mechanical Arts, treating of various water-, wind-, horse-, weight-, and hand-driven mills, and their application to grinding grain, papermaking, stamp-milling, sawing, boring, fulling, pressing. 1661 First Edition Pp. [1] f.e., (12), 68, 154 plates Nürnberg (Nuremberg) Paulus Fursten; Christoff Gerhard Contemporary full vellum with yapp edges, five sewing stations visible on spine, smooth spine with early handwritten label, and bookplate at inner front cover. Frontispiece restored at the back with three very small pieces of museum grade tape to prevent detachment. Some stains and surface soiling at the back cover. Wormwork at front inner hinge; small marginal worm trace affecting the rear endpapers and last two plates. Small restoration at the lower margin of p. 61 and small tears at the lower margins of plates 20-25. An incredibly  fresh, wide-margined copy in excellent condition. The Theatrum Machinarum Novum belongs to the distinguished tradition of illustrated machine book that flourished across Europe from the mid-sixteenth century through the Baroque period. That tradition was initiated by Ramelli's Le diverse et artificiose machine (1588) and continued by Besson, de Caus, and Zonca before reaching its German apogee in this work. The book presents Mechanica not merely as artisanal practice but as a noble art grounded in geometry and physics, balancing speculative thought with practical application. The result is a publication that belongs equally to the history of mechanics, architecture, and visual knowledge: a Baroque machine theater in which technical instruction, engraved invention, and intellectual self-definition converge with unusual coherence. The frontispiece presents an allegorical introduction to the subject. At left stands Archimedes, personifying Studium (study), while at right a mechanic or engineer (Mechanicus) embodies Labor (labor). Beyond a drawn curtain unfolds an animated industrial landscape of mills, aqueducts, and water-powered machines, all framed within a classical architectural setting. The preface defines Mechanica as a noble art derived from geometry and physics, divided into speculative and practical branches. The text (pp. 1–68) comprises an introduction to mechanical principles, followed by a systematic commentary on each plate. The 154 engraved plates constitute a comprehensive repertory of motive-power technology. They treat water-, wind-, horse-, weight-, and hand-driven mills, hydraulic pumps, fire-engines, Archimedean screws, and paper-making machinery. The designs are largely drawn from Böckler’s own inventions, with additional material derived from Jacopo Strada’s Kunstliche Abriss (1617–18). Appended is the Saxon Mühlordnung of 1568. Among the machines illustrated is an attempted design for a perpetual motion device (p. 59). The final plate is of particular significance, offering one of the earliest printed accounts of a fire-engine associated with a known maker and date (Hautsch, 1658). It describes large siphons of copper, brass, and iron, devised to project water for extinguishing fires. These machines employed dual chambers to ensure continuous pumping and were capable of raising water to a height of 80–100 feet, a remarkable achievement for the period. Both fixed and portable models are recorded, the latter sufficiently light to be operated by a single individual. Constructed and tested in Nuremberg in 1658 by Joannes Hautsch, they represent among the earliest practical fire-engines capable of reaching rooftops, contributing materially to his reputation in mechanical invention. While the mechanics and physics completely escape this reader, the engravings are as captivating as scenes from a grand Baroque theater. Each page bursts with imagination - mills, wheels, siphons, and screws transformed into works of art - whose sheer beauty and ingenuity enchant the eye. One doesn’t need to grasp the science to be utterly swept away by the spectacle of invention.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48097366311147,"sku":"129-1661--5200-2154.24-46121.9298611111","price":5200.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00129_IMG_7541copy.jpg?v=1776193300"},{"product_id":"durer-della-simmetria-dei-corpi-umani-1591","title":"Della simmetria dei corpi humani","description":"\u003cp\u003eLibri quattro. On the Symmetry of Human Bodies. 1591 First Italian Edition Leaves [1] f.e, [6], 143 (including 3 folded plates), [1] colophon; [1] r.e. Venetia (Venice) Domenico Nicolini Modern period-style binding, full morocco, with blind and gilt tooling to boards and spine; spine with five raised bands. Leaf 29 misnumbered 27; leaf 74 skipped in the pagination (but complete, as in other copies). Four double-page plates on three folded leaves (the first two only on the recto; the others printed on recto and verso on the same leaf, pp. 96–97). 110 woodcut illustrations throughout the text. Very small numerical calculations in ink on the front endpaper, in an early hand; possibly the same hand annotated the rear endpaper with notes in Italian relating to the subject matter of the book, with references to Michelangelo Buonarroti. Minor worming at the upper inner margin of the last 40 leaves, well away from text and images. The folded plate 98 has been professionally restored at the back of the fold. Light browning to a few of the final text pages. A crisp copy, in very good condition. First Italian edition of Albrecht Dürer’s celebrated treatise on human proportion, translated from the Latin version printed in Nuremberg between 1532 and 1534. Originally conceived as an instructional manual for artists and first published in German in 1528, the work applies mathematical proportion to the depiction of the human body in pursuit of harmonious form. Dürer’s position within Renaissance debates is distinctive: unlike Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo, he rejected anatomical dissection, believing that anatomy fragmented the body and obscured its unity. Geometry and proportion, by contrast, offered a comprehensive vision of the figure. Published posthumously in Venice by Nicolini in 1591, this folio edition is a cornerstone of scientific anthropometry. The translation by Giovanni Paolo Gallucci expands the original four books with a fifth, addressing the artistic representation of human diversity. Celebrated and influential, the work bridges Renaissance art theory and scientific inquiry. This treatise, written, illustrated, and designed by Dürer, is the first printed work to address comparative and differential anthropometry, drawing on classical sources (Villard de Honnecourt, Vitruvius, Alberti, and da Vinci) while presenting an original study of human physiques. Dürer’s mathematical system of proportion aimed to provide artists with tools to depict all human types, treating beauty as relative and grounded in geometry. The four books cover proportions of adults and infants, mathematical transformations of proportions, and the geometry of bodily movement, accompanied by detailed woodcut diagrams with early cross-hatching techniques. The volume contains three double-page plates and over a hundred full-page woodcut illustrations demonstrating Dürer’s mathematical and geometric approach to the human form. The illustrations are copies of the original woodcuts from the first German edition (Nuremberg, 1528), executed by Hieronymus Andreä \"Formschneider\" (literally \"the woodblock cutter\") after Dürer's widow request.  The text systematically examines human proportions through constructed scales and measurements: the body divided into seven and eight parts, separate studies of men, women, and children, variations of corpulence and thinness governed by mathematical rules, and figures shown in movement and foreshortening. Giovanni Paolo Gallucci’s Italian translation proved the most enduring and frequently cited version of Durer's masterwork during the following centuries. The work is grounded in the relationship between beauty and proportion, and between microcosm and macrocosm, concepts central not only to early modern visual theory but also to music, physiognomic and humoral theory, astronomy and astrology, cosmology, theology, philosophy, and even mnemonics and poetry. Gallucci further expanded the original work by adding a Preface, a Life of Dürer, and a Fifth Book, which provides a philosophical framework for interpreting Dürer’s original four books and situates the mathematical study of the body within a broader humanistic worldview. A chance to see inside Dürer’s mind as he works through form, proportion, and beauty, across more than a hundred woodcuts on his own design, supporting his original approach: rigorous, systematic, and unmistakably brilliant.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48097442300139,"sku":"84-1591--4900-2548-2025","price":4900.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/0084_IMG_6864.jpg?v=1776196008"},{"product_id":"tourneux-encyclopedie-chemins-1844","title":"Encyclopédie des chemins de fer et des machines a vapeur","description":"\u003cp\u003eà l'usage des praticiens et des gens du monde Encyclopedia of Railways and Steam Engines. For the use of practitioners and people of the world 1844 First Edition Pp. [1] f.e., [8], 520, XII folded tables, [1] r.e. Paris Paul Renouard Half calf over marbled boards, smooth spine with seven decorative gilt fillets, gilt title; edges sprinkled in blue. Foxing, slightly more pronounced at the beginning of the volume, becoming progressively rarer thereafter. Twelve plates mounted at the time of the binding and folded, in very good conditions. Small engraved illustrations in the text. A very good copy. First edition of this richly documented encyclopedic dictionary of railway and steam technology, published two years after the Paris-Versailles disaster of 8 May 1842, which intensified public, scientific, and legislative scrutiny of rail safety. Tourneux places rail transport within its full nineteenth-century framework: mechanics, metallurgy, bridge engineering, steam power, law, tariffs, measurement, and administration. The alphabetical form gives that rapidly evolving vocabulary practical order, preserving a field still experimental and at times dangerous, yet increasingly shaped by the conviction that disciplined knowledge could make modern transport safer and more legible. Arranged alphabetically, the work covers the technical, commercial, juridical, and scientific language of the railway and steam age. Entries move from mechanics to infrastructure and governance: \"Abattre\" (lowering heavy machine components for inspection), \"Accéléré\" (acceleration and motion), \"Dent\" (gear teeth), \"Fer\" and \"Fil de fer\" (industrial iron and wire), and \"Ferme\" (truss construction), alongside \"Abonnement\" (subscription contracts), \"Barrières\" (level crossings), \"Bascule\" (weighbridges), \"Bassin\" (hydrographic basins for route planning), \"Jurisprudence,\" \"Jury\" (indemnification tribunals under the law of 3 May 1841), and metrological entries such as \"Kilogramme\" and \"Kilomètre.\" Particularly notable is \"Chemin de fer,\" which tabulates decreed, conceded, and operational European lines as of 1844, organized by country and illustrated with major routes across France, the British Isles, and the German-speaking states. \"Accidens\" treats railway danger with unusual frankness, describing uncontrolled steam as destructive and presenting accidents as a structural risk of technical progress pending fuller scientific control. The scope also includes steam navigation (\"Bateaux à vapeur\") and vehicle dynamics (\"Lacet,\" on lateral carriage oscillation), with comparison to the 7-foot broad gauge (about 2.13 m) of the Great Western Railway. Illustration is substantial: twelve hors-texte engraved plates, including several folding sheets, plus numerous in-text woodcuts and technical diagrams. Together they depict locomotives, boilers, wheel and carriage assemblies, bridge and rail profiles, and related machinery, reinforcing the book's function as a practical technical reference. Shaped by the lessons of early railway mishaps, and anchored in a lovingly father-son tribute, this dictionary turns steam-age complexity into clarity: law, commerce, safety, and iron networks spark into ordered, purposeful knowledge.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48150053617899,"sku":"140-1844--850-123-2026","price":850.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00140_IMG_8089.jpg?v=1777187073"},{"product_id":"du-chesne-diaeteticon-polyhistoricon-1606","title":"Diaeteticon polyhistoricon","description":"\u003cp\u003eOpus utique varium, magnae utilitatis ac delectationis, quod multa Historica, Philosophica, \u0026amp; Medica, tam conservandae sanitati, quam variis curandis morbis necessaria contineat Polyhistorical Dietetics. A varied work, of great utility and delight, containing many things historical, philosophical, and medical, necessary both for preserving health and for curing various diseases. 1606 First Edition Pp. [1] f.e., 6, 171 [recte 170], 369-463, [6], [1] r.e. Parisiis [Paris] Claudium Morellum Contemporary limp vellum, hand written title and long-stitch sewing visible at spine, traces of two ties lacking. Faint early handwritten inscription at top edge of title page. The engraved author's portrait normally on *4 is missing. Some occasional foxing. A very good copy of this foundational treatise. First edition of this notable compendium of medical secrets by Du Chesne, physician to Henri IV, Calvinist diplomat, and one of the most combative promoters of chemical medicine in late sixteenth-century France.his Paracelsian treatise on dietetics, hygiene, maladies and the deleterious passions of the soul (like lust or avarice), he addresses the distinct cause of illness, situating it within a broader social context while incorporating historical anecdotes, and outlining symptoms, effects, and recommended treatments and dietary regimens. The volume was issued almost simultaneously to its French counterpart, Le Pourtraict de la sante, in an interesting case of self-translation which speaks to the large interest and popularity of the work. Drawing on ancient, medieval, and contemporary sources, it attempts to reconcile inherited medical authority with the newer ambitions of chemical medicine, in a moment when medicine, moral philosophy, household regimen, and chemical therapeutics could still meet within a single learned architecture, before the modern separation of diet, psychology, pharmacology, and moral conduct. The work is structured in three sections, following the Galenic framework of the non-naturals, enriched throughout with Paracelsian interpretation and extensive historical and medical citation. Section One, devoted to the perturbations of the soul, comprises nine chapters examining the medical consequences of ambition, avarice, envy, carnal love (amor venereus), wrath arising from bilious affection, joy, fear, and sadness. Each is treated through a combination of historical exempla, symptomatology, physiological analysis, and therapeutic guidance, forming a discourse that bridges moral philosophy and medicine. The notable chapter \"De amore venereo\" (Cap. V) traces erotic pathology from desire through jealousy, fury, and vengeance, to the ultimate fear of punishment, accompanied by marginal glosses identifying the \"fructus venereæ amoris.\" Section Two addresses the external non-naturals, including air, winds, and alimentation. Pathological discussions encompass sudor anglicus (sweating sickness), scurvy, Alsatian colic, Hungarian fever, and scrofula, alongside detailed treatment of bread and potable preparations. Central to this section is Chapter VI, \"De Vino, aliisque potibus\" (from fol. 104), a substantial and self-contained treatise on wine. Du Chesne presents wine as a divine gift for the recreation of the heart, before establishing a systematic taxonomy by colour (white, straw, pale, ruby, granato), taste (sweet, austere, pontic, mature, unripe), consistency (subtle and spirituous versus dense and sedimented), and odour. French wines receive extended attention: those of Narbonnais, Beaune, and Burgundy for their body and vigour, Gascon wines for their thickness, and Bordeaux wines, notably those circulating through the vast urban cellars described as extending beyond the city itself. Wines of Coussy, d'Hai, and Orléans are singled out as the most salubrious, favoured by French kings for their lightness and lack of noxious vapours. The discussion proceeds to the medicinal virtues of wine, extensively citing Hippocrates, Galen, Aëtius, Oribasius, and particularly Alexander of Tralles on its use in fever, phrenitis, and consumption. The chapter concludes with observations on wine in old age (after Celsus), its use as an antidote to rabid dog bite, and comparative notes on Norman cider and aqua vitae. Section Three offers practical regimens for daily life, treating herbs, fruits, meats, poultry, fish, harmful animal parts, condiments, and foods functioning both as nourishment and remedy, as well as drinks and the medicinal application of wine. Among the more notable passages are recommendations for dental hygiene, including powders of red coral and rose preparations, and a striking denunciation of sugar, described as concealing \"under its whiteness a great blackness,\" causing thirst and dental decay, and to be particularly avoided by the young. The preliminary leaves contain laudatory Latin verses. The tabula capitum at the conclusion provides a detailed index to all three sections, followed by a substantial errata leaf. We suspect Du Chesne knew it all already: he makes diet the quiet engine of health, weighing wine, air, and food with almost moral urgency. He lingers on wine's subtleties, classifying it like a physician of taste, while prescribing daily regimens that bind kitchen to clinic. What charms us are the curiosities: coral powders for teeth, sugar hiding a \"blackness,\" and unruly passions - lust, envy, wrath - corroding the body as surely as any ill-chosen meal.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48150053716203,"sku":"141-1606--1800-230-2026","price":1800.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00141_IMG_8023.jpg?v=1777187167"},{"product_id":"segato-atlante-monumentale-del-1837","title":"Atlante monumentale del Basso e dell'Alto Egitto","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eIllustrato dal prof. Domenico Valeriani e compilato dal fu Girolamo Segato con disegni tratti dalle opere di Denon, della Commissione Francese, di Gau, di Caillaud e di Rosellini e con quelli dallo stesso compilatore eseguiti sul luogo. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eMonumental Atlas of Lower and Upper Egypt illustrated by Prof. D. Valeriani and compiled by the late G. Segato, with drawings taken from the works of Denon, the French Commission, Gau, Cailliaud, and with those executed on site by the compiler himself \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003e1837 \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eVol. I: leaves [1] f.e., [2], [65] plates, [1] r.e.; Vol. II: [1] f.e., [2], [95] plates, [1] r.e. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eFirenze Nello stabilimento posto nei Fondacci di S. Spirito N.° 1993 \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eContemporary half leather over marbled paper-covered boards, spine gilt-decorated with raised bands. The binding shows wear to the corners and extremities, with well-executed repairs and restoration. Light foxing throughout, with some localized heavier spotting. The hand-coloured plates retain their original period coloring in excellent condition. A large-format atlas with binding wear, but internally preserving its magnificent plates. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eSecond edition (first published in 1835) of one of the most ambitious and lavishly illustrated nineteenth-century surveys of Egypt, uniting archaeology, topography, and landscape in a monumental atlas published at the height of Europe's fascination with the Nile. Conceived by the explorer, chemist, and antiquarian Girolamo Segato (1792-1836), the work grew out of his travels through Egypt and Nubia after 1818, where, together with the engineer Lorenzo Masi, he explored and surveyed territories extending beyond Wadi Halfa along the Blue and White Nile, regions then only imperfectly known to European scholarship. Rather than limiting itself to the celebrated monuments of the lower Nile, the atlas sought to assemble a comprehensive visual record of Egypt's ancient remains, architecture, landscapes, and antiquities, combining Segato's own field drawings with material derived from the great Egyptological expeditions of Denon, Gau, Cailliaud, Rosellini, and the French scientific commission. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eFollowing Segato's death in 1836, the work was reissued under the direction of Professor Domenico Valeriani, whose name appears alongside that of the late Segato on the title page. In that occasion, two octavo text volumes were also issued under the title Nuova illustrazione istorico-monumentale del Basso e dell'Alto Egitto, sometimes preserved together with the present Atlas. The atlas contains 160 engraved plates (numbered 1-99, with numerous plates bis, ter, etc.), including 8 double-page plates, 45 hand-colored plates (among them four of the six maps), approximately 150 aquatints devoted principally to landscapes, monuments, and city views, and approximately 150 etchings depicting costumes, animals, plants, antiquities, and architectural details. Among the most striking views is the magnificent Cairo during the Nile Flood, one of the finest panoramas of the series, but the colored depictions of objects, mummies, wall paintings are particularly striking and charming. The visual journey begins in Alexandria, with topographical plans, harbour views, and the celebrated Pianta della Città del Cairo, before following the Nile southward through Egypt. Funerary monuments and burial customs give way to the pyramids of Abu Sir, El-Lahun, and Meidum, shown in plans, elevations, and sections, while the great temple complexes of Dendera, Latopolis, Luxor, Karnak, and Thebes are documented through architectural surveys of façades, columns, capitals, ceilings, reliefs, and hieroglyphic inscriptions. Interspersed throughout are portraits of Coptic monks after Denon, studies of scarabs, amulets, funerary figures, ornaments, and other antiquities, together with scenes of contemporary Egyptian life. One particularly evocative group of plates, devoted to the desert route between Qena and Quseir, records not monuments but survival itself: water-carriers at a well, desert vegetation, and even a flea are observed with the same documentary precision as the ancient ruins. The atlas concludes with views of Philae, studies of Ababda costume and dwellings, and finely reproduced hieroglyphic manuscripts, including a beautifully illuminated example with red and black rubrication, bringing together archaeology, landscape, ethnography, and natural history in a single visual survey of nineteenth-century Egypt. Some books preserve information; this one preserves fascination. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-sheets-root=\"1\"\u003eThe hand coloring alone is enough to stop us in our tracks. Rich, luminous, and astonishingly fresh, these plates preserve the sense of wonder with which nineteenth-century Europe looked upon Egypt: a land where colossal temples, painted mummies, hieroglyphs, and everyday life seemed equally worthy of admiration. More than an atlas, it is a beautifully colored monument to Egyptomania at its most elegant.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49048619679979,"sku":"179-1837--8200-5170-2026","price":8200.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00179_IMG_9687copy.jpg?v=1784584842"},{"product_id":"cysat-mathemata-astronomica-de-loco-1619","title":"Mathemata astronomica de loco, motu, magnitudine et causis cometa","description":"\u003cp\u003e1619 First Edition\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 4to. Pp. (1) f.e., [8], 84, [4].\u003cbr\u003e\nIngolstadt\u003cbr\u003e\nEx Typographeo Ederiano\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFull contemporary limp parchment, minor soiling; manuscript title 'De Cometa' on spine. Water stains in the outer margin at the front and again in the final third, generally not touching text; browning in gatherings H, L, M, and some general toning. Title page with a mute paper seal glued on the left side; very early inscription 'Abbas d. Iulius emit. 1694' in an interline, and circular ink stamp 'Bibl. S. Puden. de Urbe' on the right. Later Owen Gingerich bookplate at the inner front cover, with motto \"Coeli enarrant gloriam Dei,\" initial G enclosing a globe; ink shelfmark on the same leaf. Some age-related defects but rare, with provenance and perfectly enjoyable. Very good.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe first treatise to record observation of a comet with a telescope, and the earliest to describe and depict a cometary nucleus and its surrounding coma, with provenance from the Library of Owen Gingerich. Cysat's Mathemata astronomica belongs to the lively debate surrounding the great comets of 1618, when new scientific instruments were challenging old cosmologies. From parallax, Cysat placed the comet far beyond the Moon, helping to displace the Aristotelian view of comets as atmospheric vapors and bringing his observations into line with those of Tycho Brahe and other Jesuit astronomers. The apparitions of 1618 also provoked the bitter comet controversy in which Orazio Grassi in Rome and Cysat in Germany argued from parallax for distant celestial bodies, while Galileo (ill and without having observed the comets himself) treated them as atmospheric optical effects and dismissed parallax measurements as inconclusive. On the central physical question, the Cysat and the Jesuits were right.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eCysat sets out his treatise in seven chapters that move methodically from raw observation to physical cause, a structure he announces in the preface. The first chapter assembles the observations themselves, running from 1 December 1618 to 22 January 1619, each position of the comet fixed by its distance from two fixed stars; a table on p. 20 gathers the results in parallel columns of latitude, longitude, declination, right ascension, digression from the sun, and diurnal motion. From this foundation, the later chapters build outward. Caput IV traces the coma and tail across the sky in a sequence of full-page woodcuts, carrying the comet through Boötes, Virgo, and Draco, while a large plate sets its path against the orb of the sun. Caput VI explains and depicts the head resolving over the course of December from a solid disc into a swarm of starry points; Cysat likens three bright starlets within it to the luminous companions of Jupiter, \"aeque clarae atque lucidissimi Iovis Comites\" (\"as bright as Jupiter's brightest satellites\"). The same chapter contains his much-discussed remark on a nebulous appearance, on the strength of which he is sometimes, probably wrongly, credited with the discovery of the Orion Nebula. Cysat's work formed part of a wider contemporary discussion of the comet: Kepler, who corresponded with Cysat and visited Ingolstadt, and Orazio Grassi both published treatments of the same apparition in 1619.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe provenance is particularly apt: this copy comes from the library of Owen Gingerich (1930-2023), the Harvard historian of astronomy and author of the celebrated census of surviving copies of Copernicus's De revolutionibus.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eCute bear images (with fur and all), strange angels, interestingly dressed gentlemen... oh wait, they are constellations (Ursa, Virgo, Boötes), and the book is all about a comet racing across the sky 400 years ago?! And it is not your average phenomenon: the comet was observed for the first time with a telescope, and, again for the first time, described with its nucleus and surrounding coma, sparking a debate with Galileo, who was exceptionally wrong. Gingerich knew it was an exceptional volume, and his bookplate proving the provenance reminds us that astronomy rarely gets this many goosebumps in one book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49385892380907,"sku":"144-1619--5800.00-2286.00-2026","price":5800.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00144_IMG_8755_29437c71-a61d-4d4e-ac76-0dc0391b7f00.jpg?v=1788989972"},{"product_id":"praun-abbildung-und-beschreibung-1859","title":"Schmetterlinge u. Raupen. Abbildung und Beschreibung europäischer Schmetterlinge.","description":"\u003cp\u003e1859 First Edition\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 4to. Papiliones: [9] leaves, 78 pp., 41 plates (2 b\/w; 39 colored). Bombyces: [3], [25] leaves, 25 plates (1 b\/w, 24 colored). Sphinges: [4], [11], 11 plates (1 b\/w, 10 colored). Noctuae: [4], [41], 41 plates (1 b\/w, 40 colored). Geometrae: [4], [21], 21 plates (21 colored). Microlepidoptera: [3] leaves, 69 pp., 32 plates (32 colored). Prospectus: pp. 12.\u003cbr\u003e\nNürnberg\u003cbr\u003e\nBauer \u0026amp; Raspe\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eOriginal publisher's half-cloth cartonnage, with black cloth spines over gray cardboard boards; yellow paper mounted on the covers, printed with editorial information and completed in manuscript with the title of each of the six volumes. Some rubbing and soiling; joints generally a little loosened and in some cases carefully restored in modern times to avoid further damage. The plates are fresh, with strong color, minimal offsetting, and generous margins. The prospectus carries twice the violet oval handstamp of K. Schimmelpfeng's Buchhandlung, Mülheim-Ruhr, Viktoriastrasse. Very good.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFirst and only edition of a great illustrated work of the nineteenth-century European entomology. Devoted to the butterflies and moths of Europe, Praun's work has a layered publication story: it began publication in fascicles in 1858 and grew into a substantial large-quarto undertaking comprising 42 parts, 166 finely colored plates, and representations and descriptions of more than 2,300 species. Publication extended over more than a decade, with the individual taxonomic families also offered separately by the publisher as self-contained units, accounting for the complex sectional organization of surviving sets and the present six-volume arrangement. A complementary work devoted to the caterpillars, revised and completed after Praun's death by Ernst Hofmann, eventually followed separately in 1874-75; the appearance of \"Schmetterlinge u. Raupen\" on the present title page, suggests that the caterpillars had already been envisaged within the broader scope of the project.\u003cbr\u003e\nCombining encyclopedic scholarship with sumptuous illustration, Praun conceived the work as a practical reference for identifying and comparing butterflies and moths. Working as both compiler and systematist, he drew upon an extensive network of collectors and correspondents, acknowledging among his collaborators Freiherr von Welser zu Neuhof and the schoolmaster Fehr of Gunzenhausen. In his preface, dated Nuremberg, November 1857, Praun laments that the study of butterflies and moths still remained too much the province of amateurs because reliable illustrated references were either incomplete, prohibitively expensive, or difficult to use. His ambition was to produce a comprehensive, systematic, and accessible iconography of the European Lepidoptera. The publishing history, preserved in the successive title pages, traces the project through the Nuremberg firm of Julius Merz, Ludwig Korn, and Emil Küster between 1859 and 1869, year of Praun's death.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe work, organized in 6 lean volumes, comprises 171 plates, of which 5 steel engravings in black\/white and 166 beautifully hand-colored plates, illustrating more than 2,300 species, accompanied by detailed systematic descriptions. An additional small pamphlet represents the Prospectus to guide through the volumes organization.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe first book opens with a dedication to G. J. K. Freiherr von Welser von und zu Neuhof, whom Praun acknowledges as both friend and patron of natural-scientific research. A preliminary essay on classification (Bemerkungen zur Systematik) sets out a remarkably modern view of taxonomy, arguing that only individual organisms exist in nature, while genera are human constructions based upon shared structure and habits, and that climate, nourishment, migration, cultivation, and hybridization continually produce new forms. An explanation of abbreviations follows, citing the principal authorities of European entomology (such as Linné, Fabricius, Esper, and Hübner to Boisduval, Ochsenheimer, Treitschke, and Zeller) and identifying anatomical terminology and figures borrowed from earlier works. The systematic catalogue begins with the Papiliones genus by genus, each species treated with synonymy, food plant, flight period, and geographical distribution. It continues with Bombyces, Sphinges, Geometrae and Microlepidoptera.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe magnificent hand-colored plates form the heart of the work, portraying specimens with exceptional scientific precision and artistic refinement: over 2,300 delicate and vivid butterflies and moths come to life through the pages.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eCataloguing this magnificent work took us several sessions, not because it is particularly complicated, but because we kept losing count of the plates... and track of time. More than 2,300 butterflies and moths, each hand-colored with astonishing precision, have a way of distracting even the most disciplined bibliographer. A masterpiece of nineteenth-century science, but also a glorious excuse to stop working and simply look.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49385892610283,"sku":"151-1859--4000.00-1564.00-2026","price":4000.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00151_IMG_8715-2_2.jpg?v=1788991293"},{"product_id":"sguario-dissertazione-sopra-le-1738","title":"Dissertazione sopra le aurore boreali","description":"\u003cp\u003e1738 First Edition\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 4to. Pp. [1] f.e., 119, [1]; [1] folding illustration; [1] table; II plates.\u003cbr\u003e\nVenezia (Venice)\u003cbr\u003e\nPietro Bassaglia\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eVellum binding, soiled and stained; red offset stain to the back cover. Spine rubbed, showing an earlier vellum binding beneath, indicating that the volume has been rebound at an early date. Water stain at the front and rear endpapers; early restoration to the front one. Very well-executed and marginal restorations to the title page (visible only against a light source). Bottom margin slightly chipped at the central gatherings; small and very well-executed restorations. Despite this, overall internally handsome. Very good.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe rare appearance of the northern lights (aurora borealis) over Venice on the night of 16 December 1737 provided Eusebio Sguario with the occasion for this learned dissertation on natural philosophy. At a latitude where such displays were highly unusual, the phenomenon caused widespread alarm among the city's inhabitants, and Sguario sought to replace fear with reason through a systematic explanation grounded in mechanics, optics, astronomy, and observation, offering a revealing example of Enlightenment science and an early Italian contribution to Newtonian physics.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe work opens with the author's candid address to the reader, in which Sguario states that his theory is presented as probable and likely, rather than demonstrated, and that he was only at the beginning of his fifth lustrum (so about twenty-five years of age), and the treatise was completed in approximately thirty days.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe book is illustrated with a particularly striking large folding engraved plate depicting the aurora over Venice, showing rays and luminous columns rising above the horizon; curiously, the references to the \"second\" and \"third\" hours of the night follow the Venetian system of timekeeping, counting the hours from nightfall rather than from midnight. It is complete with 2 tables of geometrical demonstrations supporting the author's optical theory.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe dissertation begins with a survey of the history and geography of the aurora, collecting reports from across Europe, including the observations at Brévillepont in 1726 and 1731 and the Venetian display of 1737. Sguario reviews the regions in which the phenomenon might be observed and reproduces, with corrections, the engraved \"Tavola delle Aurore Boreali del Sig. de Mairan\".\u003cbr\u003e\nRejecting both the ancient and contemporary theory that the aurora resulted from combustible vapors or subterranean fires, Sguario proposes a distinctly Newtonian explanation, attributing the phenomenon to the reflection and refraction of sunlight in a lofty atmospheric cloud identified with the zodiacal light, or solar atmosphere. His argument draws upon planetary attraction, cometary atmospheres, the mechanics of rarefied matter, and the geometry of parabolic and hyperbolic motion, illustrated by detailed mathematical diagrams.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eAuroras are rare enough on their own. At this latitude, over Venice, they're improbable to the point of disbelief. Yet it happened, and this book, with its almost supernatural black-and-white engraving of luminous rays dancing above the lagoon, tries to bring us there. Sguario was all science and optics, but can you imagine the magic?\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49385894478059,"sku":"171-1738--1800.00-650.00-2026","price":1800.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00171_IMG_0437.jpg?v=1788993006"},{"product_id":"anonymous-al-gioco-cinese-1818","title":"Al gioco cinese chiamato il Rompicapo","description":"\u003cp\u003e1818 First Edition\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 8vo. Pp. 1-34, [4], 35-38, [4], 39; 12 plates\u003cbr\u003e\nMilano (Milan)\u003cbr\u003e\nPietro e Giuseppe Vallardi\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eOriginal orange printed wrappers, worn; spine rubbed, upper wrapper chipped. Untrimmed, wide-margined paper with minor marginal foxing and light toning. Some modern internal reinforcements at the inner margin with Japanese paper, well executed and not affecting the illustrations. Twelve plates, hand-colored in yellow, pink, blue, and green watercolor by a contemporary hand. Extremely rare ephemeral booklet, overall in good condition.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this rare book, historically significant as a very early Italian publication dedicated to the Tangram, the famous seven-piece Chinese dissection puzzle (the very first book on the subject was published in Italy the previous year).\u003cbr\u003e\nThe little volume was published in Milan in the same year as a Florentine edition, which appears to have sepia-toned engraved plates rather than the pastel hand-colored ones found in the present Milan copy. The two editions differ in pagination, as noted by comparison with the digitized Florence copy available online (Internet Archive). The comparison also confirms that the pages headed \"Tavola\" begin with Tavola V (5): plates 1-4 reproduce the alphabet and therefore do not require explanatory Tavole. In the present copy, the Tavole are bound within the text rather than within the sequence of illustrated plates.\u003cbr\u003e\nIn the catalogue entry for the Florentine copy presently offered by Peter Harrington, the Milan edition is described as \"surfacing slightly less regularly\" than the Florentine one, with the observation that \"At auction, Florentine copies have appeared three times (...) and one Milanese is recorded.\"\u003cbr\u003e\nNo priority between the two editions has been established when copies have previously surfaced on the market.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe European Tangram craze of the early nineteenth century manifested itself in Italy not only as a passion for the puzzle but also as a vehicle for satire. This figure album turns the seven-piece \"Rompicapo\" or \"Testa-rotta\" (Tangram) into a display of chinoiserie, mock erudition, and social comedy. Issued anonymously and commonly attributed to a Roman playwright, it frames the game with a witty discourse on progress, Chinese customs, and European manners, then treats the seven geometric pieces composing the puzzle as an alphabet of comic invention.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe title announces Tangram figures representing the alphabet, the nine Arabic numerals, men, beasts, houses, coaches, boats, urns, vases, and other domestic furnishings, preceded by an introductory discourse on the game Rompicapo and on China, where it originated.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe introduction is particularly interesting, being an often ironic essay that contextualizes the game's sudden popularity in Europe. Employing an Orientalist literary device, it playfully critiques the Western obsession with fashionable novelties while presenting the Tangram as a window into Chinese culture, patience, and philosophy.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe text cites George Macartney and his historic 1793 diplomatic mission to the Qianlong Emperor, effectively the first British embassy to China. Although the mission failed to secure expanded trade, it fascinated Europe through the detailed journals that described Chinese society and court life. It also mentions Lorenzo Magalotti, whose publication of early seventeenth-century accounts of China is invoked to lend intellectual authority to the puzzle and to demonstrate that Western fascination with Chinese learning had deep roots.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe illustrations form the heart of the book, and they are arranged as an appendix of figures, providing the models that readers are invited to recreate with their seven Tangram pieces. Their captions (in the \"Tavole\" interrupting the text pagination) are particularly engaging, including Kneeling Eunuch, Back-Bending Flatterer, Urn Containing the Ashes of Confucius, Meditating Philosopher, Rowing Duck, Aerostatic Mummy, Scholar Giving Birth to His Work, Robe of the Emperor Wu Wang, and Steam Carriage (in the original Italian: Eunuco genuflettente, Adulatore dorso-curvante, Urna delle ceneri di Confucio, Filosofo meditante, Anatra remigante, Mummia aereostatica, Letterato che partorisce l'opera, Tunica dell'Imperatore Vou-vang, and Vettura a vapore).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eWe have a weakness for books that refuse to choose between play and erudition. Part puzzle book, part tongue-in-cheek essay on Europe's fascination with China, this delightful Tangram manual rewards both the hands and the imagination. And then there are the irresistible (although cryptic) figures: a Kneeling Eunuch, a Back-Bending Flatterer, even a Scholar Giving Birth to His Work. Who could resist?\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49385894510827,"sku":"172-1818--2800.00-931.00-2026","price":2800.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00172_IMG_0463.jpg?v=1788993071"},{"product_id":"barla-iconographie-des-orchidees-1868","title":"Iconographie des Orchidées","description":"\u003cp\u003e1868 First Edition\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn Folio. Pp. [1] f.e., [8], 83, [3], 63 plates\u003cbr\u003e\nNice\u003cbr\u003e\nImprimerie Caisson et Mignon\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eContemporary green cloth over marbled paper boards; spine lettered in gilt. General rubbing to marbled boards, especially at the corners. An ink presentation inscription on the half-title. Blind stamp at the bottom of the first three plates \"Colorié par M.me Lemaitre\". A beautiful copy in an unassuming binding. Fine.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe first French-language monograph devoted specifically to the orchid family. Jean-Baptiste Barla, primarily known as a naturalist and mycologist, brought the same exhaustive rigor to this book: each of the sixty-three hand-colored lithographed plates comes with a full citation trail through Linnaeus, Tournefort, Reichenbach fil., Grenier and Godron, and Parlatore, and instead of a vague range map, gives the plant's exact local station and the month it flowers.\u003cbr\u003e\nBarla chose his subject for a reason: as his own preface explains, the Alpes-Maritimes compress an unusual cross-section of Europe's orchid flora into one stretch of coastline and mountains, and nearly every species found across France, Italy, and Germany turns up somewhere within it.\u003cbr\u003e\nVincent Fossat, Barla's regular collaborator for decades, rendered every species at natural size rather than reducing it to fit the page - not a decorative flourish but the science itself, since distinguishing closely related orchids by variety depended on exactly this kind of precision.\u003cbr\u003e\nThis copy carries an authorial presentation at the half-title: the inscription opens with \"Hommage\" and closes with what reads as Barla's own signature, evidence of a gift copy from the naturalist himself - but the one name that would identify who received it has been erased, leaving only the gesture of the author's gift and not its object.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe title page enumerates Barla's long list of appointments and nominations, testifying to his respectability - among them the directorship of the Musée d'Histoire Naturelle de la Ville de Nice. In hindsight, this note is particularly interesting: Barla's collections became foundational to the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle de Nice. He housed the museum of the Niçois naturalist Jean-Baptiste Vérany on his own premises beginning in 1863, and on his death bequeathed his own buildings, collections, and library to the city. Today's museum, with more than a million specimens, grew from the collections assembled by Barla and Vérany together.\u003cbr\u003e\nNice had become French only eight years before this book appeared, but Barla treats the Alpes-Maritimes as a botanical crossroads rather than a political boundary: Mediterranean and alpine orchids, French and Italian botany, local specimens and an international scientific network, all rendered at natural size across sixty-three hand-colored plates.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn his preface, Barla explains what drew him specifically to the Alpes-Maritimes: within an unusually narrow stretch of coast and mountains, the region brings together plant life otherwise scattered across much of Europe. Mediterranean orchids grow wild in its coastal hills and valleys, alpine species take over at higher elevations, and Barla remarks that nearly every orchid native to France, Italy, Germany, and the neighboring regions can be found somewhere within this single territory.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe work is a systematic account of the wild orchids of Nice and the Alpes-Maritimes, organized by tribe and genus according to the classification adopted by Lindley, Endlicher, and Reichenbach fil. Each species entry combines an extensive international synonymy with a French morphological description and records of the plant's local stations and flowering season.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe tribe Arétusées opens the systematic text with the genus Limodorum Tourn., whose generic characters are given in full: monandrous flowers, a free and operculate terminal anther, powdery or granular pollen masses, and a unilocular, three-valved capsule. The first species, Limodorum abortivum Swartz, is cited to Tournefort, Linnaeus, Swartz, Reichenbach fil., Grenier and Godron, Parlatore, Boissier, Koch, Gussone, Bertoloni, and Ardoino's own Flore analytique du département des Alpes-Maritimes, and is described as bearing four to twenty large, strikingly colored flowers, violet shaded with yellow. The volume proceeds in this manner through a further 62 species, with abundant detail and careful observation.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe beautiful plates completing the volume combine a colored study of the full habit of each plant with a numbered array of dissected floral and anatomical details; the finer analytical figures are left uncolored, and each species is rendered at natural size rather than reduced to fit the page. On many plates, traces of fine hand-finishing are visible over the colored lithographs.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSurely Barla's fungi could have entered a beauty contest, but his orchids would have made the podium: sixty-three plates, drawn from life and delicately hand-retouched, with every petal and spur gorgeous enough to prove it.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"La Fenice Antiquaria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49385895362795,"sku":"187-1868--3500.00-1335.00-2026","price":3500.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/files\/00187_IMG_0475.jpg?v=1788993975"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0766\/2000\/5611\/collections\/00187_IMG_0475.jpg?v=1789491432","url":"https:\/\/fenicebooks.com\/en-kr\/collections\/fourteen-books-on-observation-and-invention-1591-1868.oembed","provider":"La Fenice Antiquaria","version":"1.0","type":"link"}