PUTEO, Augustino á.
Gnomonices biformis ...
Venice, Antonio Bosio, 1679. 4 parts in 1 volume. 4to. With a richly engraved allegorical frontispiece, a woodcut "fides" printer's device on each of the 4 typographical title-pages (for part 1, part 2-1, part 2-2, and parts 3 and 4 together, 73 engraved perspectival illustrations and figures in the text, a large folding plate showing a table and diagram, 183 full-page plates with tables and diagrams, a folding engraved plate and 2 near full-page plates of the globe's declinations. Further with woodcut decorated initials, head- and tailpieces throughout. Contemporary elaborately blind-tooled vellum over wooden boards, sewn on 4 supports with corresponding raised bands on the spine, with a detailed Jesuit "IHS" device as a center-piece on the front board and a similar device with different letters on the back board. Further with brass clasps (1 complete, other only a catchplate) a paper label on the spine with the manuscript title in brown ink and the manuscript title and shelfmark at the head of the fore-edge in brown ink, blind-tooled board edges and turn-ins, red edges. [1], [1 blank], [21], [1 blank], "136" [= 132]; [1], [1 blank], [6], 88; [1], [1 blank], [6], 12, [1 large folding and 183 full-page engraved tables], [1 blank]; 56 pp.
€ 7,000
Rare first edition of an extensive text book on the projection of light from all parts of the universe for use of perspectival designs of sun-dials and the calculation of time for all places on earth. Nothing is known about the author, here called "Augustino á Puteo" on the title-page, but also referred to as Agostino Pozzi or Augustinus Puteus. He probably was a relative of Andrea Pozzo, the famous author of Prospettiva de' Pittori e Architetti, and also a Jesuit.
The present work is divided into four parts and is based on the geometrical and astronomical teachings of Euclid, Theodosius, and the teaching of Apollonius on cones. The fine engraved frontispiece illustrates the drawing in perspective and the shadows thrown on a pedestal on which a sphaerical globe is standing. The book is richly illustrated with perspectival projections and includes the full tables and perspectival diagrams of all declinations of the earth.
According to the blind-tooled decorations on the binding and the inscription on the title-page, the present work has been part of a Jesuit library ("Collegii Societatis Anno 1688").
Fine copy.- (Most part of one brass clasp los; few wormholes in top of spine). With a near contemporary manuscript owner's inscription on the title-page: "Collegii Societatis Anno 1688". The binding is somewhat dust-soiled and shows some wormholes around the spine, one of the clasps and one of its catch-plates are lost, slightly affecting the first and last few pages, otherwise internally fine and clean. Overall in very good condition. Honeyman Coll. 2530; Riccardi I, 2, pp. 316-7; Sotheran I, 3743; STC Italian, 17th century, p. 704 (ed. of 1693); USTC 1713329.
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