Details
PURKINJE, Jan Evangelista (1787-1869). Beobachtungen und Versuche zur Physiologie der Sinne... Zweites Bndchen. Neue Beitrge zur Kenntniss des Sehens in subjectiver Hinsicht. Berlin: G. Reimer, 1825.
Volume 2 only, 8o (197 x 120 mm). 4 folding plates containing a total of 50 small numbered engraved or aquatint figures after the author's drawings, most with added hand-coloring. Contemporary pastepaper boards, gilt lettered parchment lettering piece, edges stained green (slight wear to extremities). Provenance: Halle, Chirurgisches Clinicum der Knigl. Universitt (inkstamp on title-page).
FIRST EDITION of the second part of Purkinje's full-length exposition of his important research into visual phenomena. Part I, published in 1823 and not included in this copy, consists of a word-for-word reprint of his inaugural thesis of 1819 (see preceding lot). "Purkyne observed and studied the puzzling visual sensations produced by strong intermittent illumination (the 'light-shadow figure'), by pressure on the eyeball, or by galvanic stimulation. He also showed the possibility of seeing the shadows of one's own retinal vessels (Purkyne's figure or tree) when these shadows fall on the neighboring sensitive elements... Much attention has been paid to the 'Purkyne phenomenon' or 'Purkyne shift'... a change in the apparent relative luminosity of colors in a dim light (scotopic vision) compared with that in full daylight (phototopic vision) that is due--as became known later--to different visual sensory mechanisms (the rods and the cones, respectively). He also discovered the physiological inability of peripheral parts of the retina to distinguish colors, overlooked by all previous specialists. Owing to his exceptional ability to observe himself and to concentrate on the details of sensations, he detected many phenomena that other observers went to great pains to confirm" (DSB).
The work is dedicated to Goethe, who explored the field of visual phenomena in his principal work on optics, Zur Farbenlehre (1810), but who shared the view of most of his contemporaries that such phenomena were generally aberrations. "In contrast... Purkinje was aware that the subjective sensory phenomena were neither exceptions to the otherwise clear laws of nature nor a matter of chance, but that they had a physiological basis" (DSB). The remarkable hand-colored aquatint illustrations attempt to reproduce the visions seen by the closed eye when subject to various external stimuli. Like all of Purkinje's works, the present treatise is EXTREMELY RARE. Garrison-Morton 1494.1; Kruta, p. 79; Waller 7669 (volumes I and 2); Norman 1764.
Volume 2 only, 8
FIRST EDITION of the second part of Purkinje's full-length exposition of his important research into visual phenomena. Part I, published in 1823 and not included in this copy, consists of a word-for-word reprint of his inaugural thesis of 1819 (see preceding lot). "Purkyne observed and studied the puzzling visual sensations produced by strong intermittent illumination (the 'light-shadow figure'), by pressure on the eyeball, or by galvanic stimulation. He also showed the possibility of seeing the shadows of one's own retinal vessels (Purkyne's figure or tree) when these shadows fall on the neighboring sensitive elements... Much attention has been paid to the 'Purkyne phenomenon' or 'Purkyne shift'... a change in the apparent relative luminosity of colors in a dim light (scotopic vision) compared with that in full daylight (phototopic vision) that is due--as became known later--to different visual sensory mechanisms (the rods and the cones, respectively). He also discovered the physiological inability of peripheral parts of the retina to distinguish colors, overlooked by all previous specialists. Owing to his exceptional ability to observe himself and to concentrate on the details of sensations, he detected many phenomena that other observers went to great pains to confirm" (DSB).
The work is dedicated to Goethe, who explored the field of visual phenomena in his principal work on optics, Zur Farbenlehre (1810), but who shared the view of most of his contemporaries that such phenomena were generally aberrations. "In contrast... Purkinje was aware that the subjective sensory phenomena were neither exceptions to the otherwise clear laws of nature nor a matter of chance, but that they had a physiological basis" (DSB). The remarkable hand-colored aquatint illustrations attempt to reproduce the visions seen by the closed eye when subject to various external stimuli. Like all of Purkinje's works, the present treatise is EXTREMELY RARE. Garrison-Morton 1494.1; Kruta, p. 79; Waller 7669 (volumes I and 2); Norman 1764.