Science
Contact Andrea Mazzocchi
Science at Quaritch is broadly defined, ranging from medicine, anatomy, pharmacology (including herbals) and natural history to astronomy, physics, chemistry and mathematics.
An interest in the origins of modern chemistry has led to a specialisation in works on alchemy and distillation, and from there we have also branched out into occultism and hermeticism. We have developed an interest in gastronomy and books on nutrition and wine, an area which over the years has become one of our specialities.-
PANTHEO, Giovanni Agostino.
Voarchadumia contra alchimiam: ars distincta ab archimia, et sophia: cum additionibus, proportionibus,...
Venice, [Giovanni Tacuino], 1530.
First edition, first issue, of this rare alchemical work, highly unusual for its early use of four-colour printing.
£18000
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HIPPOCRATES.
Ἱπποκράτους Κώου ιατρού παλαιοτάτου, πάντων ἄλλων κορυφαίου,...
Basel, Hieronymus Froben and Nicolaus Episcopius, 1538.
A heavily annotated copy of the second Greek edition of Hippocrates’s Works, a much more accurate text than the first, Aldine, edition of 1526. Janus Cornarius (1500–1558) undertook this edition of Hippocrates at the suggestion of Erasmus. He claimed to have corrected or re-established...
£3750
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GABRIELE, Giacomo.
Dialogo di M. Iacomo Cabriele, nelquale de la sphera, et gli orti et occasi de le stelle, minutamente si...
[Colophon:] Venice, Giovanni de Farri et fratelli, 1545.
First editions of the two principal works of Giacomo Gabriele (1510–1550), nephew and pupil of the Italian humanist Trifone Gabriele, the first with numerous contemporary annotations.
£3500
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BLANCHON, Jacques.
Iacobi Blanchoni ucessiensis adversus Ludovicum beneventanum abbatem selestensem defensionum liber.
Lyon, Jean de Tournes, 1550.
First edition of a very rare work of sixteenth-century Lyonnese Neoplatonism, an elegantly-printed de Tournes edition. Ostensibly a simple series of remarks against the theses of the (presumably sternly Scholastic) abbot of Selestan, this is a tract of Renaissance moral philosophy. The theme of...
£950
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LANDI, Bassiano.
De origine et causa pestis Patauinae, anni MDLV ...
Venice, apud Balthassarem Constantinum (colophon: ‘Ioan. Gryphius excudebat’), 1555.
First edition of this important work investigating the causes of the plague which struck Padua in 1555, by the eminent, and controversial, professor of medicine Bassiano Landi (d. 1562). In his De origine Landi argues against the then popular belief that the plague had been caused by putrid...
£1250
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BALDUINO, Girolamo.
Quaesitum novum pulcherrimum, ac optatissimum contra Scotum, ac communem viam in quo enucleatur an de subiecto...
Naples, Raymundus Amatus, 1557.
Scarce first editions of two early works on Aristotelian logic by Girolamo Balduino, an important member of the Paduan school of Aristotelian commentators who have been recognised in recent scholarship as a crucial link between traditional logic and science and the new, Galilean methodologies....
£1250
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BULLEIN, William.
[Bulleins Bullwarke of Defe[n]ce against all Sicknes, Sornes, and Woundes, that dooe daily assaulte Mankind...
[1562. Imprinted at London: by Jhon Kingston].
First edition, very scarce, of an important work of medical humanism written in prison by William Bullein (c. 1515–1576), this copy imperfect (though with minimal loss to the main text) but heavily annotated in a near-contemporary hand. Bullein and Sir Thomas Smith were ‘the most...
£5250
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PADOVANI, Giovanni.
Opus de compositione et usu multiformium horologiorum solarium pro diversis mundi regionibus, idque ubique...
Venice, Francesco de Franceschi, 1570.
Scarce first edition of Padovani’s treatise on sundials, providing illustrated instruction on the use of various horizontal and vertical sundials and on calculating latitude, this copy owned and annotated by the author’s friend and collaborator Johannes Andrea de Muscis.
£3750
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STANHUF, Michael.
De meteoris libri duo, quorum prior tradit de aethere et elementis. Posterior complectitur omnium fere meteororum...
Wittenberg, [Johann Krafft for Samuel Selfisch], 1578.
An attractive sammelband of two scarce astronomical works, in an appealing contemporary binding and with some interesting annotations, opening with the second edition (first 1562) of the chief work of Michael Stanhuf (d. 1608), a student of Melanchthon at Wittenberg.
£2750
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RICHARDUS ANGLICUS.
Correctorium alchymiae ... Das is reformierte Alchimy, oder Alchimeibesserung, und Straffung der Alchimistischen...
Strasbourg, Bernard Jobin, 1581.
first edition of ‘a very rare collection’ (Duveen). There are five treatises: Richardus Anglicus’ Correctorium and Reformierte Alchimei; Lull’s Apertorium et accuratio vegetabilium, and Vom philosophischen Stein, and Geber’s Secretum. The thirteenth-century Richardus Anglicus or Richard of...
£6000
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[SACROBOSCO, Johannes de.]
CLAVIUS, Christophorus. In sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco commentarius, nunc iterum ab ipso Auctore...
Rome, Francesco Zanetti for Domenico Basa, 1581.
Third edition, the first to contain Clavius’s condemnation of Copernicus, with ten highly detailed woodcut diagrams of solar and lunar eclipses not included in the first edition.
£2500
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FINÉ, Oronce.
Opere di Orontio Fineo … divise in cinque parti, arimetica, geometria, cosmografia, e orivoli, tradotte da...
Venice, Francesco Franceschi, 1587.
First Italian edition of the works of Finé. Among the most influential scientific scholars of the sixteenth century, over three decades at the Collège Royale Oronce Finé (1494–1555) made considerable contributions to various branches of mathematics, from geometry and arithmetic to astronomy...
£2750
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MERCURIALE, Girolamo.
De arte gymnastica libri sex, in quibus exercitationum omnium vetustarum genera, loca, modi, facultates,...
Venice, [Lucantonio II] Giunta, 1587.
Third edition of ‘the first illustrated book on gymnastics’ (Morton). A physician occupying senior posts in the medical faculties of Padua, Bologna, Rome, and Pisa, Girolamo Mercuriale (1530–1606) draws heavily on accounts of ancient exercise to argue for its medical benefits, being the...
£2750
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CATANEO, Girolamo.
De arte bellica, sive de designandis ac construendis arcibus et propugnaculis, necnon et de iis oppugnandis,...
Lyons, Jean de Tournes, 1600.
First Latin edition, scarce on the market, of this handsomely illustrated military classic, first published in Italian at Brescia in 1564. Edited and published by Jean de Tournes, this edition is dedicated to Henry IV of France. The military architect Cataneo (active 1540-1584) was considered,...
£1850
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AELIANUS, Claudius, Conrad GESSNER (translator), and Pierre GILLES (editor).
Περι ζωων ιδιοτητος...
Cologny, Philippe Albert, 1616.
Uncommon Geneva edition of Aelianus’s De animalium natura, the Greek printed in parallel with Gessner’s Latin translation. A third-century work on natural history, Aelianus’s text offers accounts and anecdotes of animals, ‘an appealing collection of facts and fables about the animal...
£300
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MARKHAM, Gervase.
Cavalarice, or the English Horseman: Contayning all the Art of Horse-manship, asmuch as is necessary for any...
London, Edward Allde for Edward White, [1616–] 1617.
A beautiful copy of the second edition, ‘corrected and augmented’, of Markham’s Cavalarice, exceptionally well-preserved in a contemporary binding, from the library of the antiquary Sir John Marsham.
£12000
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[ROSICRUCIANISM.]
Fortalitium scientiae, das ist: die unfehlbare, volkommeliche, unerschätzliche Kunst aller Künsten und...
[Nuremberg], 1617.
First edition of this tract on Rosicrucianism which purports to have been written by Hugo de Alverda, an imaginary and very old Rosicrucian character.
£2850
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RUINI, Carlo.
Anatomia del cavallo, infermità, et suoi rimedii: opera nuova, degna di qualsivoglia prencipe, & cavaliere, & molto...
Venice, Fioravante Prati, 1618.
Fourth edition of the first detailed study in veterinary anatomy and an extremely important work in the history of anatomy as a discipline.
£6000
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[ANDREAE, Johann Valentin.]
Reipublicae Christianopolitanae descriptio ...
Strasburg, heirs of Lazarus Zetzner, 1619.
A rare and influential Renaissance political utopia, in a fine sammelband of four first editions by the Lutheran humanist Johann Valentin Andreae (1586–1654).
£12500
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RAIMONDI, Eugenio.
Delle caccie … libri Quattro, aggiuntovi’n questa nuova ’mpressione il quinto libro della villa.
[Naples, Lazzaro Scoriggio, 1626].
Second edition, expanded and extended, with a new series of striking venatic plates. The series of plates (attributable to Nicolas Perrey, who signs the title), showing composite scenes of hunters pursuing animals from birds and fish to lions and elephants, is wholly new, replacing the woodcut...
£2500