Memorials of Galileo Galilei, 1564-1642 : Portraits and paintings, medals and medallions, busts and statues, monuments and mural inscriptions / by J.J. Fahie ; with 20 portraits and 42 other illustrations.

  • John Joseph Fahie
Date:
1929
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Memorials of Galileo Galilei, 1564-1642 : Portraits and paintings, medals and medallions, busts and statues, monuments and mural inscriptions / by J.J. Fahie ; with 20 portraits and 42 other illustrations. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    sc, 1818. (5) In Drinkwatcr-Bcthune’s Life of Galileo in “Library of Useful Knowledge,” London, 1829, there is a good lithographic frontispiece after Benvenuti. (6) The same has been reproduced by W. W. Bryant in his little book “Galileo,” London, 1918, published by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. (7) A large engraving inscribed: — Nach. Justus Pustermann [sic | Singer sc. Galileo Galilei Stabilto. Artco. del Lloyd Austrco. in Trieste. This is a pretentious composition, and utterly untrue to the work of Sustcrmans. I have seen frauds which bore more resemblance to their pretended originals than this—indeed, I am inclined to class it as a fraud pure and simple. It shows a man in the prime of life, thirty-five, instead of sixty-nine. The background consists of sea, high land, and the upper part of a tower, with open flag. Behind the standing figure is a large celestial globe. The left hand holds a roll of paper, on the turned corner of which are the words E Pur [si muove]. Altogether a whimsical study. (8) In Mathilde Raven’s “Galileo: Romanzo Storico,” Torino e Napoli, 1869 (Tradotto dal Tedesco da Gustavo Strafforello), the frontispiece is, clearly, copied from Benvenuti—good in a way but not a faithful copy. On the right arm one sees faintly a monogram thus £ which might stand for Luigi Calamatta, a well-known engraver of Brussels in the first half of the last century. (9) Our seventh and last copy of Benvenuti is prefixed to Brewster’s biography of Galileo in “Martyrs of Science,” London, edition of 1874. The portrait is reversed, showing the characteristic wart on the risrht cheek instead of the left. The other reproductions of Sustermans’ 1635 portrait, of which we have notes, can be put in a table, as we have nothing of any interest concerning them.