Sacrobosco, Johannes de (John of Holywood). Sphaera Ioannis de Sacro Bosco emendata. Eliae Vineti Santonis scholia in eandem sphaeram, ab ipso auctore restituta.

€ 8,500.00

Rare edition of the most important astronomical work of the Middle Ages. This edition includes Melanchthon's 1531 preface (mistakenly dated August 1540; the names of Melanchthon and Grynaeus have been suppressed) as well as later astronomical texts by Al-Farghani, Pedro Nunes, Regiomontanus, etc. Among the woodcuts is a globe map of Europe, Africa, and part of Asia on leaf 43v - apparently an improved version of the "Globus Mundi" map mentioned by Shirley on p. 33. At the end is a folded plate with parts of movable diagrams, to be cut out and mounted on the corresponding figures in the text. The two tables announced in "De ortu poetico", ff. 54v/65r, are not present, as usual.

Occasional ink annotations, some quite extensive, by a near-contemporary owner, including a sphere in red ink drawn on the original front flyleaf (preserved) and a geocentric planetary diagram in the lower margin of f.23v. A lenghtly quotation from Macrobius is written on the lower flyleaf, preserved at the end.