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.-
GALILEI, Galileo.
Discorsi e dimostrazioni matematiche, intorno a due nuove scienze attenenti alla mecanica & i movimenti locali...
Leiden, Elzevier, 1638.
First edition of the first modern textbook of physics and the foundation of the science of mechanics; a very important copy, owned and annotated by Pierre Varignon, intimate friend of Newton, Leibniz, and the Bernoullis.
£195000
-
GALILEI, Galileo.
Dialogo … sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo Tolemaico, e Copernicano.
Florence, G.B. Landini, 1632.
First edition of one of the most famous works in the history of scientific thought, Galileo’s defence of Copernican heliocentrism, which led to his trial and imprisonment for heresy.
£160000
-
BISSON, Louis-Auguste.
‘Wildfire’.
Paris, c. 1844.
An extraordinary equine portrait, testimony to the improvements made in the daguerreotype process made by Louis-August Bisson which allowed greater spontaneity through shorter exposure times.
£14500
-
PONTANO, Giovanni.
De rebus coelestibus.
Naples, ‘ex officina Sigismundi Mayr Germani : summo ingenio artificis Ioannetto Salodio : Antonio Vuerengrundt : Evangelista Papiensi :...
First editions of three works on cosmology, ethics, and astrology by the Neapolitan humanist, poet, and polymath Giovanni Pontano (1426–1503), an important sammelband from the celebrated library of Ulisse Aldrovandi (1522–1605), professor of natural philosophy and natural history at the University...
£12500
-
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
-
[LOO, Pieter van, (attributed).]
156 watercolours of flowers, plants, and fruits.
[Holland, c. 1760–80].
A truly stunning collection of over 150 original eighteenth-century botanical watercolours, attributed to the noted Dutch botanical artist Pieter van Loo (1731–1784).
£110000
-
POCOCKE, Richard.
A Description of the East, and some other Countries.
London: W. Bowyer for the Author, [‘and sold by J. and P. Knapton, W. Innys, W. Meadows, G. Hawkins, S. Birt, T. Longman, C. Hitch, R. Dodsley,...
First edition, demy folio issue. The traveller and cleric Pococke (1704-1765), was educated at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and graduated BA in 1725, BCL in 1731, and DCL in 1733. His family’s ecclesiastical connexions and his facility at navigating the complexities of clerical patronage enabled...
£8000
-
TARTAGLIA, Niccolò Fontana.
Quesiti, et inventioni diverse.
Venice, Venturino Ruffinelli ‘ad instantia et requisitione, & a proprie spese de Nicolo Tartalea Brisciano Autire’, July 1546.
First edition, annotated throughout by a contemporary reader, of Tartaglia’s highly influential work on ballistics and algebra, containing his polemical rule for solving cubic equations.
£6750
-
BERRYAT, Jean, et al., editors.
Receuil de Mémoires, ou Collection de Pièces Académiques, concernant la Médicine, l’Anatomie...
Dijon, Auxerre, Paris and Liège, F. Desventes, F. Fournier, et al., 1754-86.
The scarce first collected edition of these scientific papers from all over Europe (lacking only the last five volumes of the Partie Française), including among its contributors such famous names as Huygens, Leeuwenhoek, Hevelius, De La Hire, Mariotte, Réaumur, La Condamine, Haller, Maupertuis, Boyle,...
£6000
-
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
-
DONOVAN, Edward.
An epitome of the natural history of the insects of China: comprising figures and descriptions of upwards of...
London, Printed for the Author by T. Bensley, 1798[-99].
First edition of this splendid work devoted to the insects of China by the great natural historian and artist Edward Donovan (1768–1837), including some of the most beautiful of all his plates.
£5750
-
DEPARCIEUX, Antoine.
Essai sur les probabilités de la durée de la vie humaine; d’où l’on déduit la manière de déterminer...
Paris, chez les frères Guerin, 1746.
A large, crisp and illustrious copy of the first edition of a classic of statistical science: it is the first to define expectation of life – which Deparcieux calls ‘la vie moyenne’ – and the first to contain life tables for men and women.
£5500
-
GASPAROLI, Carlo Maria.
Dialectica sive manuductio ad logicam dictata a R. P. Bar. De Somere. Scripta a me Car. Mar. Gasparoli....
Antwerp, 1753.
A handsome manuscript comprising a thorough course in logic and dialectic, executed by a student at the Jesuit college in Antwerp, and illustrated with an extraordinary decorative programme inspired by printed emblems.
£4750
-
BUCKNILL, Charles.
Notes from medical lectures.
London, February – April 1798.
A most interesting medical manuscript by one Charles Bucknill recording lectures given in 1798 by the Scottish anatomist Matthew Baillie (1761–1823) and the English obstetrician John Clarke (1758–1815). Bucknill – likely a forebear of the psychiatrist and mental health reformer Sir John...
£4500
-
[REMEDIES.]
‘Livre de remedes pour les asmatiques et pulmoniques’.
France, second half of 17th century?
An attractive pocket-sized manuscript book of secrets, containing hundreds of medicinal remedies, technical and culinary recipes, household hints, and hunting tips assembled by an anonymous compiler.
£4500
-
ARNALDUS DE VILLANOVA.
Computus ecclesiasticus et astronomicus ... noviter impressum.
Venice, Bernardino Vitali, 17 February 1501.
Rare first edition, the Erwin Tomash copy, with numerous early marginalia showing a close analysis by a near-contemporary reader.
£4500
-
KUNCKEL VON LÖWENSTERN, Johann.
Collegium physico-chemicum experimentale, Oder Laboratorium Chymicum, In welchem Deutlich und...
Hamburg and Leipzig, Samuel Heyl, 1716.
the rare first edition of a famous chemical handbook, the most important work of the leading german chemist of the second half of the seventeenth century. Partington, devoting pp. 361-77 of vol. II to Kunckel, gives ‘a nearly complete bibliographical account with comment’ (Marie Boas Hall in DSB),...
£4000
-
COLONNA, Fabio.
Φυτοβασανος, sive Plantarum aliquot historia …
Naples, Orazio Salviani, 1592.
First edition, a landmark in botanical illustration, ‘the first strictly botanical book with intaglio prints’ (Blunt).
£4000
-
BONET, Nicolas.
Habes Nicholai Bonetti viri p[er]spicacissimi quattuor volumina: Metaphysicam videl[icet] naturale[m] phylosophia[m]...
Venice, Boneto Locatello for the heirs of Ottaviano Scoto, 1505.
First collected edition of the works of the French Franciscan Friar Nicolas Bonet (c. 1280–1343), owned and annotated by the Italian historian, biographer, and physician Paolo Giovio (1486–1552).
£4000
-
VISSCHER, Nicolaes [I].
Avium vivae et artificiosissimae delineationes.
Amsterdam, Nicolaus [I] Visscher, 1659.
First and only edition of this rare set of ornithological prints by the famed cartographer Nicolaes Visscher I.
£3750