GUERICKE, Otto von (1602-1686). Experimenta nova (ut vocantur) Magdeburgica de Vacuo Spatio... Accesserunt de aeris pondere circa terram; de virtutibus & mundanis, & systemate mundi planetario; sicut & de stellis fixis, ac spatio illo immensio. Amsterdam: Johannes Janssonius, 1672.
GUERICKE, Otto von (1602-1686). Experimenta nova (ut vocantur) Magdeburgica de Vacuo Spatio... Accesserunt de aeris pondere circa terram; de virtutibus & mundanis, & systemate mundi planetario; sicut & de stellis fixis, ac spatio illo immensio. Amsterdam: Johannes Janssonius, 1672.

Details
GUERICKE, Otto von (1602-1686). Experimenta nova (ut vocantur) Magdeburgica de Vacuo Spatio... Accesserunt de aeris pondere circa terram; de virtutibus & mundanis, & systemate mundi planetario; sicut & de stellis fixis, ac spatio illo immensio. Amsterdam: Johannes Janssonius, 1672.

In-folio (310 x 194 mm). Frontispice allégorique, portrait, 2 planches dépliantes et 20 grandes illustrations dans le texte, le tout finement gravé sur cuivre. (Quelques feuillets légèrement brunis.) Vélin ivoire de l'époque, titre manuscrit au dos. Provenance: Jersey, bibliothèque Jésuite (cachet sur le titre) -- Librairie Ambroise Lefèvre (cachet sur le titre) -- Pierre Duhem (ex-libris).

PREMIèRE éDITION. UN DES PLUS BEAUX OUVRAGES DE PHYSIQUE.
Les Experimenta nova restituent les brillantes recherches menées par Guericke, ingénieur et mécanicien. Dès 1650, il met au point la première pompe à air. Il met en évidence la pression atmosphérique lors de la célèbre expérience de Magdebourg. La grande planche dépliante a valeur de reportage devant le spectacle de 16 chevaux tirant de part et d'autre la sphère en cuivre vidée de son air.

Il propose l'usage d'un baromètre à eau et l'utilise pour la prévision du temps (1662). Il imagine la première machine électrostatique et tire des étincelles de son globe de soufre, ce qui le conduit à concevoir la nature électrique des phénomènes orageux. "His discovery of the elasticity of the air was the most important result of Guericke's experiments, as it led him to investigate the decrease of air densiy with height, to study the variation in air pressure corresponding to changes in weather, and to experiment further with the phenomena connected with vacuums, especially the work of capacity of air" (Norman). TRèS BEL EXEMPLAIRE. Norman 952; Wheeler Gift 170; Horblit 44 ("Invention of the air pump, the first electric generating machine, and the famous Magdebourg hemispheres".)
Further details
First edition of Guericke's own report on his famous Magdeburg experiment with air-pressure. Gaspar Schott had already described it 15 years earlier (see lot 157). The full-sheet engraved plate showing two teams of horses in a vain attempt to pull apart two copper hemispheres from which the air has been pumped, has become one of the most reproduced illustrations in the history of science, but other engravings in the edition also confirm the second half of the 17th century as the Dutch golden age in book illustration. Guericke's discovery of the air-pump and his description of it are of the greatest importance, but his many discoveries in electricity and electrical phenomena are also explained and signify important advances on Gilbert (see the previous lot). Fine copy, in contemporary Dutch vellum.

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