NEWTON, Isaac (1642-1727). Optice: sive de reflectionibus, refractionibus, inflexionibus & coloribus lucis libri tres, London: Sam. Smith & Benj. Walford, 1706, 4° (237 x 186mm.), FIRST EDITION IN LATIN, 19 folding engraved plates (one plate affected by paper fault, small hole to Aa2 affecting text but sense recoverable, tear to margin of 3E1, occasional annotations in ink and pencil, some underlining in blue crayon to few pages of part IV of the second book), contemporary panelled calf (rebacked, joints strengthened). [Babson 137; Norman 1589; Wallis 179].

Details

NEWTON, Isaac (1642-1727). Optice: sive de reflectionibus, refractionibus, inflexionibus & coloribus lucis libri tres, London: Sam. Smith & Benj. Walford, 1706, 4° (237 x 186mm.), FIRST EDITION IN LATIN, 19 folding engraved plates (one plate affected by paper fault, small hole to Aa2 affecting text but sense recoverable, tear to margin of 3E1, occasional annotations in ink and pencil, some underlining in blue crayon to few pages of part IV of the second book), contemporary panelled calf (rebacked, joints strengthened). [Babson 137; Norman 1589; Wallis 179].

Provenance

B. Blomfield, inscription to endpaper.

Lot Essay

"In the Latin edition Newton added seven new "Queries" to the sixteen already published in the English edition, as well as a two-page preface noting his corrections of the text. It was in the added queries (nos. 17-23 in the Latin edition; 25-31 in the later editions) that Newton took a strong stand in favor of the corpuscular theory of light, pointing out the difficulties posed by a theory of waves in an ethereal medium ... The Latin edition, like the first in English, ends with the two papers in which Newton attempted to prove his priority over Leibniz in the invention of the calculus." (Norman)

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