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GALILEO GALILEI (1564-1642)
Istoria e dimostrazioni intorno alle macchie solari e loro accidenti ... si aggiungono nel fine le Lettere, e Disquisizioni del finto Apelle. Rome: Giacomo Mascardi, 1613. 2 parts in one volume, 4° (225 x 160mm). Printer's woodcut device on title, part i with full-page engraved portrait of Galileo [by Francesco Villamena], 38 full-page engraved illustrations of sunspots, 5 engraved plates of Jupiter's satellites, engraved and woodcut illustrations; part ii with section-title, one folding engraved plate, 4 engraved illustrations, one full-page, woodcut diagrams in text. Woodcut initials. (Occasional light spotting.) Contemporary semi-flexible vellum, spine titled in manuscript (covers slightly marked and bowed, edges slightly rubbed and chipped). Provenance: early manuscript deletions/amendments on part i, pp. 102, 109, and 162 (vide infra) -- small marginal inkstamp on A2r.
FIRST EDITION. GALILEO'S FIRST PUBLISHED ENDORSEMENT OF THE COPERNICAN MODEL AND HIS DISCOVERY OF SUNSPOTS AND OF THE SATELLITES OF JUPITER. Marcus Welser of Augsburg had published a treatise on sunspots by the jesuit Christopher Scheiner (under the pseudonym Apelles) in 1612, and sent a copy of it to Galileo for his opinion. Galileo replied in three long letters (published as Istoria e dimostrazione), 'demolishing Scheiner's conjecture that the spots were tiny planet' (DSB V, p. 242) and giving an account of his discovery of sunspots, thus claiming priority over Scheiner (for Scheiner's later work on sunspots, Rosa ursina, cf. lot 73). In this work, Galileo announced for the first time his discovery of the satellites of Jupiter and also 'spoke out decisively for the Copernican system for the first time in print [... and] found a place for his first published mention of the concept of conservation of angular momentum and an associated inertial concept. During its composition he had taken pains to determine the theological status of the idea of incorruptibility of the heavens, finding that this was regarded by churchmen as an Aristotelian rather than a Catholic dogma' (loc. cit.). However, this work prompted some disquiet in theological circles and attacks on Galileo soon followed; although Galileo did not immediately suffer any injurious consequences, these attacks initiated a series of events which culminated in his trial and imprisonment. The subsequent censure of Galileo's ideas by the Catholic church may well be responsible for the neat erasures and amendments which occur on the three pages of part i noted above, all of which relate to the Copernican (heliocentric) interpretation of the universe: in the first on p. 102 the words 'e non è egli ancora controverso se l'istessa terra resti immobile, ò pur vadia vagando, mentre che noi siamo certissimi de i movimenti di non poche stelle?' had been heavily scored through; in the second on p. 109 the passage 'E sì come à i molto periti nella scienza Astronomica, bastava l'haver inteso quanto scrive il Copernico nelle sue revoluzioni per accertarsi del revolgimento di Venere intorno al Sole e della verità del resto del suo Sistema' has been amended by the substitution of the word 'sapere' for 'accertarsi' and the deletion of 'della verità'; in the third on p. 162, the words 'e queste diversità nascono dal movimento annuo della Terra' have been amended to end 'annuo del sole'. This 'domestic' issue (which is described by Bibliotheca mechanica as the second) contains the second part, Scheiner's 'De maculis solaribus tres epistolae' (not present in the other issue); an alternative explanation for the two issues is that in the Italian market there would be no copyright dispute, as there would with an issue intended for export. Since Scheiner was then teaching at Ingolstadt, the printer Mascardi would be able to publish his letters in Italy, but north of the Alps privileges would be infringed. The portrait of Galileo which appears as a frontispiece is the first to be published in one of his works, and was also included in Il saggiatore (1623), with the artist's name given beneath the image (see the following lot). Bibliotheca mechanica pp. 125-126; Carli and Favaro 60; Cinti 44; cf. Riccardi I, cols 509-510 (issue without Scheiner's letters).
Istoria e dimostrazioni intorno alle macchie solari e loro accidenti ... si aggiungono nel fine le Lettere, e Disquisizioni del finto Apelle. Rome: Giacomo Mascardi, 1613. 2 parts in one volume, 4° (225 x 160mm). Printer's woodcut device on title, part i with full-page engraved portrait of Galileo [by Francesco Villamena], 38 full-page engraved illustrations of sunspots, 5 engraved plates of Jupiter's satellites, engraved and woodcut illustrations; part ii with section-title, one folding engraved plate, 4 engraved illustrations, one full-page, woodcut diagrams in text. Woodcut initials. (Occasional light spotting.) Contemporary semi-flexible vellum, spine titled in manuscript (covers slightly marked and bowed, edges slightly rubbed and chipped). Provenance: early manuscript deletions/amendments on part i, pp. 102, 109, and 162 (vide infra) -- small marginal inkstamp on A2r.
FIRST EDITION. GALILEO'S FIRST PUBLISHED ENDORSEMENT OF THE COPERNICAN MODEL AND HIS DISCOVERY OF SUNSPOTS AND OF THE SATELLITES OF JUPITER. Marcus Welser of Augsburg had published a treatise on sunspots by the jesuit Christopher Scheiner (under the pseudonym Apelles) in 1612, and sent a copy of it to Galileo for his opinion. Galileo replied in three long letters (published as Istoria e dimostrazione), 'demolishing Scheiner's conjecture that the spots were tiny planet' (DSB V, p. 242) and giving an account of his discovery of sunspots, thus claiming priority over Scheiner (for Scheiner's later work on sunspots, Rosa ursina, cf. lot 73). In this work, Galileo announced for the first time his discovery of the satellites of Jupiter and also 'spoke out decisively for the Copernican system for the first time in print [... and] found a place for his first published mention of the concept of conservation of angular momentum and an associated inertial concept. During its composition he had taken pains to determine the theological status of the idea of incorruptibility of the heavens, finding that this was regarded by churchmen as an Aristotelian rather than a Catholic dogma' (loc. cit.). However, this work prompted some disquiet in theological circles and attacks on Galileo soon followed; although Galileo did not immediately suffer any injurious consequences, these attacks initiated a series of events which culminated in his trial and imprisonment. The subsequent censure of Galileo's ideas by the Catholic church may well be responsible for the neat erasures and amendments which occur on the three pages of part i noted above, all of which relate to the Copernican (heliocentric) interpretation of the universe: in the first on p. 102 the words 'e non è egli ancora controverso se l'istessa terra resti immobile, ò pur vadia vagando, mentre che noi siamo certissimi de i movimenti di non poche stelle?' had been heavily scored through; in the second on p. 109 the passage 'E sì come à i molto periti nella scienza Astronomica, bastava l'haver inteso quanto scrive il Copernico nelle sue revoluzioni per accertarsi del revolgimento di Venere intorno al Sole e della verità del resto del suo Sistema' has been amended by the substitution of the word 'sapere' for 'accertarsi' and the deletion of 'della verità'; in the third on p. 162, the words 'e queste diversità nascono dal movimento annuo della Terra' have been amended to end 'annuo del sole'. This 'domestic' issue (which is described by Bibliotheca mechanica as the second) contains the second part, Scheiner's 'De maculis solaribus tres epistolae' (not present in the other issue); an alternative explanation for the two issues is that in the Italian market there would be no copyright dispute, as there would with an issue intended for export. Since Scheiner was then teaching at Ingolstadt, the printer Mascardi would be able to publish his letters in Italy, but north of the Alps privileges would be infringed. The portrait of Galileo which appears as a frontispiece is the first to be published in one of his works, and was also included in Il saggiatore (1623), with the artist's name given beneath the image (see the following lot). Bibliotheca mechanica pp. 125-126; Carli and Favaro 60; Cinti 44; cf. Riccardi I, cols 509-510 (issue without Scheiner's letters).
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