Volume 2

Bibliographical notes on histories of inventions and books of secrets : Six papers read to the Archæological society of Glasgow April 1882-January 1888 / by John Ferguson.

  • John Ferguson
Date:
1895-1915
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Bibliographical notes on histories of inventions and books of secrets : Six papers read to the Archæological society of Glasgow April 1882-January 1888 / by John Ferguson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    use. Neither of the preceding is in the British Museum. The copies which are there are dated respectively Venice [1508], 1518, 1545, 1640, 1645. The book, therefore, must have met some sort of want, else it could hardly have reached the ripe age of a hundred and eighty years. 5. In bibliography it is sometimes almost startling how books related to one another, and of unquestionable rarity, come together from quite different quarters. It is not so long ago since I got a copy of the 1520 edition of the Secreta Secretorum, and the description of it was hardly pub- lished when a copy of the no less rare German translation made its appearance. Das aller edlest und bewer | test Regiment der gesundtheyt, Auch von alien ver- | borgen kiinsten vn Ktinigklichen Regimenten Aristotelis. Das er dem Grossmech | tigen Kiinig Alexandro zugeschriben hatt. Auss Arabischer sprach durch Meister | Philipsen, dem Bischoff Vonn Valentia, der Stat Jerapolis, In das latein | verwandlet, Nachmals auss dem latein in das Teijtsch gebracht, Bey | Doctor Johan Lorchner zu Spalt (So beyder Keyser Fiydrichs | vn Maximilians Loblicher gedechtnuss Rath vn Mathe- | maticus gewesen) nach seinem tod geschribe gefunden | zu auffenthaltung vn fristung yn gesundtheit | menschlichem lebenn zu gStt; Durch Jo- | hann Besolt in Truck verordnet. | [Vignette]. M.D.XXX1. Small 4to. A to N in fours; or ff. [4] xlviii. The Vignette represents Aristotle presenting his book to Alexander. Aj contains the title; verso, Vorrede; Aij recto to Aiij recto, the Contents; Aiij recto, Aristotle’s preface, ends Aiiij recto. Aiiij verso is taken up with a woodcut of Alexander in the dress of a royal warrior of the year 1531. B to Niiij recto contains the text. At the end is the colophon: Gedruckt zu Augspurg durch Heynrich Stayner, Am. 1. | tag Martij, des M.D.XXXI. Jars | The verso is blank. So far as it goes this is a translation of the first part of the 1520 edition, embracing the Secreta Secretorum and omitting the tracts Sigtia teniporum, de Intellectu, de Universalities and others formerly enumerated.* But there are several omissions; for instance, a part of the chapter on Stones (German Translation, chap, lix.) and sections both at the begin- ning and the end of the book. It has not however been disembowelled like the English translation of 1702.! Supplement II., Transactions, III., 1897, p. 180. t Part IV., p. 326.