Brahe, Tycho | Epistolarum astronomicarum libri, Uraniborg, 1596, Daniel Melanderhielm's copy

Brahe, Tycho

Epistolarum astronomicarum libri. Uraniborg: [colophon:] ex officina typographica authoris, 1596

First edition, first issue, very rare at auction, with the ownership inscription of renowned eighteenth-century Swedish astronomer Daniel Melanderhielm.

The text was subsequently reissued in Nuremberg in 1601 and Frankfurt in 1610 with new title-pages and, in the latter case, some reset preliminary leaves. Although Nielsen lists about 40 copies in libraries, this first issue is rare on the market. This is the first (and only) volume of Tycho's correspondence on astronomical matters, with Landgrave Wilhelm IV of Hesse-Kassel and his astronomer Christoph Rothmann between 1585 and 1595, published at Tycho's own press on the island of Hven, which enabled Tycho to print works to his own exacting standards and in timely fashion despite the remoteness of his location on Hven; he even had a paper mill constructed on the island. It was the first of a projected series of volumes of his correspondence, as Tycho corresponded with over eighty individuals; this was one of the main forms of scientific exchange in early modern Europe. Landgrave Wilhelm was a keen astronomer who desired to produce a new catalogue of the stars, and the correspondence discusses results from the observatories in Kassel and Hven; at one point Tycho exhorts Rothmann to abandon his adherence to Copernican heliocentrism. The letters also contain descriptions of the comet of 1585 and of the observatory on Hven. The year after the publication of this volume, Tycho left Hven for good, taking his press with him to Copenhagen and Wandsbeck; he finally reached the court of Rudolf II in Prague in 1599.

This copy notably includes the ownership inscription of Daniel Melanderhielm (1726–1810), professor and rector of Uppsala University, who published several works on celestial mechanics, as well as works on pure mathematics. Later, it was owned by the astrophysicist Hans Ludendorff (1873–1941), director of the Astrophysical Observatory of Potsdam and author of the Ludendorff Catalogue of the globular cluster Messier 13.

4to (220 x 170 mm). Small woodcut vignette on title-page, woodcut initials, 3 woodcut diagrams, 5 woodcut illustrations of Brahe's observatory, of which 2 full-page, one woodcut map, large woodcut device on final leaf, numerous marginal annotations in an early modern hand; some spotting and marginal dampstaining, title-page and a few other leaves repaired at margins. Eighteenth-century half calf, spine with raised bands in six compartments; spine ends slightly worn.

REFERENCES

BL STC Scandinavian B977; Dibner, Heralds 4; Houzeau & Lancaster 7824; Nielsen 430; Adam Mosley, "Astronomical Books and Courtly Communication," in Books and the Sciences in History (Cambridge University Press: 2000), pp. 114–131

PROVENANCE

Daniel Melanderhielm, prominent Swedish mathematician and astronomer (ownership inscription to front free endpaper) — M. L. Borromeo Arese/ M. Favia del Core (bookplate) — Hans Ludendorff, German astrophysicist (bookplate) — "H. Duarte" (ownership inscription to title-page)