![GALILEI, Galileo (1564-1642). Discorsi e dimonstrazioni matematiche, intorno due nuove scienze attenenti alla mecanica & i movimenti locali. Leiden: [Bonaventure and Abraham] Elzevier, 1638.](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2005/CKS/2005_CKS_07046_0267_000(101606).jpg?w=1)
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GALILEI, Galileo (1564-1642). Discorsi e dimonstrazioni matematiche, intorno due nuove scienze attenenti alla mecanica & i movimenti locali. Leiden: [Bonaventure and Abraham] Elzevier, 1638.
4° (197 x 147mm). Woodcut Elzevier device on title [Rahir Les Elzevier M7], woodcut illustrations, diagrams, ornamental initials, head- and tailpieces, letterpress tables. Text of the dialogues in italic type, formal proofs in roman type. Errata leaf 2R4 at end. (Some gatherings lightly spotted and browned, light dampstaining, unobtrusive marginal wormholes in first gathering.) Contemporary limp vellum, spine with early manuscript shelfmarks and later gilt roan lettering-pieces (vellum cockled and a little discoloured, skilful later replacement of section of spine and lower cover, lettering-pieces slightly chipped, recased, endpapers replaced). Provenance: Giulio Torino, 'medico e filosofo', 1646 (inscription on title) -- errata on pp. 43, 73, and 229 corrected in an early hand, errata leaf neatly scored through and corrections noted below -- ideographic inkstamp on verso of errata -- ideographic inkstamps on free endpapers.
FIRST EDITION. 'THE FIRST MODERN TEXTBOOK OF PHYSICS, A FOUNDATION STONE IN THE SCIENCE OF MECHANICS' (Grolier Science). Following his trial by the Inquisition in 1633 (provoked by the publication of his Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo in 1632), Galileo was left 'so crushed that his life had been feared for' (DSB), but in 1634, at the behest of his friend and supporter Ascanio Piccolomini, the Archbishop of Siena, Galileo began to collate his life's work in physics. Forbidden to publish in Florence or Rome by the Congregation of the Index, and unable to obtain an ecclesiastical licence to print the work in Venice, Galileo managed to have a manuscript copy smuggled out of Italy to France by le comte de Noailles, the French ambassador to whom the work is dedicated, and from France it was brought to Bonaventure and Abraham Elzevier in Holland.
The mathematical analyses of the Discorsi complement the philosophical discussion of the Dialogo, and Galileo retained the formal device of the dialogue with the same interlocutors: Salviati, Sagredo and Simplicio. 'The two new sciences with which the book principally deals are the engineering science of strength of materials and the mathematical science of kinematics ... Of the four dialogues contained in the book, the last two are devoted to the treatment of uniform and accelerated motion and the discussion of parabolic trajectories. The first two deal with problems related to the constitution of matter; the nature of mathematics; the place of experiment and reason in science; the weight of air; the nature of sound; the speed of light; and other fragmentary comments on physics as a whole. Thus Galileo's Two New Sciences underlies modern physics not only because it contains the elements of the mathematical treatment of motion, but also because most of the problems that came rather quickly to be seen as problems amenable to physical experiment and mathematical analysis were gathered together in this book with suggestive discussions of their possible solution' (DSB). The influence and consequences of the Discorsi (which was translated into French by Mersenne in 1639) were far-reaching: 'Mathematicians and physicists of the later seventeenth century, Isaac Newton among them, rightly supposed that Galileo had begun a new era in the science of mechanics. It was upon his foundations that Huygens, Newton and others were able to erect the frame of the science of dynamics, and to extend its range (with the concept of universal gravitation) to the heavenly bodies' (PMM). Brunet II, 1462; Carli and Favaro 162; Cinti 102; Dibner Heralds 141; Grolier Science 36; Norman 859; PMM 130; Rahir Les Elzevier 464; Riccardi I, col. 561; Roberts & Trent Bibliotheca Mechanica, pp. 129-130; Wellcome 2648; Willems 468.
4° (197 x 147mm). Woodcut Elzevier device on title [Rahir Les Elzevier M7], woodcut illustrations, diagrams, ornamental initials, head- and tailpieces, letterpress tables. Text of the dialogues in italic type, formal proofs in roman type. Errata leaf 2R4 at end. (Some gatherings lightly spotted and browned, light dampstaining, unobtrusive marginal wormholes in first gathering.) Contemporary limp vellum, spine with early manuscript shelfmarks and later gilt roan lettering-pieces (vellum cockled and a little discoloured, skilful later replacement of section of spine and lower cover, lettering-pieces slightly chipped, recased, endpapers replaced). Provenance: Giulio Torino, 'medico e filosofo', 1646 (inscription on title) -- errata on pp. 43, 73, and 229 corrected in an early hand, errata leaf neatly scored through and corrections noted below -- ideographic inkstamp on verso of errata -- ideographic inkstamps on free endpapers.
FIRST EDITION. 'THE FIRST MODERN TEXTBOOK OF PHYSICS, A FOUNDATION STONE IN THE SCIENCE OF MECHANICS' (Grolier Science). Following his trial by the Inquisition in 1633 (provoked by the publication of his Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo in 1632), Galileo was left 'so crushed that his life had been feared for' (DSB), but in 1634, at the behest of his friend and supporter Ascanio Piccolomini, the Archbishop of Siena, Galileo began to collate his life's work in physics. Forbidden to publish in Florence or Rome by the Congregation of the Index, and unable to obtain an ecclesiastical licence to print the work in Venice, Galileo managed to have a manuscript copy smuggled out of Italy to France by le comte de Noailles, the French ambassador to whom the work is dedicated, and from France it was brought to Bonaventure and Abraham Elzevier in Holland.
The mathematical analyses of the Discorsi complement the philosophical discussion of the Dialogo, and Galileo retained the formal device of the dialogue with the same interlocutors: Salviati, Sagredo and Simplicio. 'The two new sciences with which the book principally deals are the engineering science of strength of materials and the mathematical science of kinematics ... Of the four dialogues contained in the book, the last two are devoted to the treatment of uniform and accelerated motion and the discussion of parabolic trajectories. The first two deal with problems related to the constitution of matter; the nature of mathematics; the place of experiment and reason in science; the weight of air; the nature of sound; the speed of light; and other fragmentary comments on physics as a whole. Thus Galileo's Two New Sciences underlies modern physics not only because it contains the elements of the mathematical treatment of motion, but also because most of the problems that came rather quickly to be seen as problems amenable to physical experiment and mathematical analysis were gathered together in this book with suggestive discussions of their possible solution' (DSB). The influence and consequences of the Discorsi (which was translated into French by Mersenne in 1639) were far-reaching: 'Mathematicians and physicists of the later seventeenth century, Isaac Newton among them, rightly supposed that Galileo had begun a new era in the science of mechanics. It was upon his foundations that Huygens, Newton and others were able to erect the frame of the science of dynamics, and to extend its range (with the concept of universal gravitation) to the heavenly bodies' (PMM). Brunet II, 1462; Carli and Favaro 162; Cinti 102; Dibner Heralds 141; Grolier Science 36; Norman 859; PMM 130; Rahir Les Elzevier 464; Riccardi I, col. 561; Roberts & Trent Bibliotheca Mechanica, pp. 129-130; Wellcome 2648; Willems 468.
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