Bibliographical notes on histories of inventions and books of secrets.

  • John Ferguson
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Bibliographical notes on histories of inventions and books of secrets. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

    37/428 (page 21)
    again in any of my subsequent papers. Recently, however, some other copies have come into my hands. The rarest of them, probably, is the first edition of the French translation, Paris, 1556, in a handsome quarto, superior in its style to the edition of 1572. There is also another edition in Italian (Venice, 1558-59), in 4'’, and an octavo edition published at Bologna, without a date, but about the middle of the sixteenth century. By far the most interesting and rarest item, however, is the sole fragment that remains of a proposed and partially executed translation into English. It consists of the introduction and the sections which deal with gold and silver, occurring in the signature *4 to 8 and ff. i to 10 verso of the 1540 edition. It was executed by Richard Eden, and is contained in his edition of Peter Martyr’s Decades of the New World, printed at London in 1555, ff. 326 verso to 342 recto. There are few books rarer than this last. Besides the copy I now exhibit I know only of the copy in the British Museum, and another in the University Library, Cambridge. The section from Biringuccio would merit reprinting as an appendix to a separate dissertation on the knowledge of mines and metals, possessed by the author in the early part of the sixteenth century. 20. As the modern scientist deems his duty to long-suffering humanity but hardly discharged if he has not published a text book on what he designates “ our science,” the older representatives of the class acted as if an obligation were laid on them to discuss the whole system of the universe. They did not conceal their aim, and they certainly showed considerable power in either collecting and repeating, or m inventing explanations of the wonders and mysteries which the physical, spiritual and moral worlds contain. Among these the work of Jerome Cardan, of Milan, Dt Subtilitate, is conspicuous. It was first published in 1550; it passed through many editions, and was translated into various languages. There are three copies of this book to refer to. Hieronymi Cardani Mediolanensis Medici, De Svbtilitate Libri xxi. Nvnc Demvm ab ipfo autore recogniti atque perfect!. Lvgdvni, Apud Guliel. Rouillium. 1554. 8vo, signatures : o, /3, 7, 5, in eights ; e in four; a to z, A to Z, Aa to Ee, all in eights, of which Ee 8 is blank ; or pp. [72] 813 [3 blank].