Habes lector Johannis de Sacro Busto sphere textum una cum additionibus non aspernandis Petri Cirvelli . cum ipsiusmet sublimi et luculentissima expositione aliquot figuris noviter adiunctis decorata. Intersertis praeterea quaestionibus domini Petri de Alliaco; Omnia peruigili cura ad amussim castigata. Et rursus coipressa.

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August 1515. Folio (270 x 190 mm) LXXXI (i.e. 79) leaves, woodcut printer's device on title-page, woodcut initials, woodcut illustrations and diagrams in text, without the final blank. Printed in Gothic letter, two columns. Signatures: (a-m)6 (n-o)4 (-o4), print date from colophon on n4 verso. 17th-century limp vellum (restored, cover soiled, extremities rubbed, lacking free endpapers but stubs of vellum manuscript preserved). Text only very little browned, occasional mainly marginal brown spotting, tear in leaf d3 slightly affecting woodcut diagram on verso, a few text corrections and markings in ink. A very good copy. ---- Honeyman 2726; Shaaber H325; Moreau II, 1515/1216. - RARE EDITION by Petit with the commentary of the astrologer and mathematician Pedro Cirvelo (1470-1548) who includes the recent discoveries of the New World. Sacrobosco's Sphaera is one of the great Renaissance books. It was the most important work on astronomy, next to Ptolemy's, in the Age of Discovery. Printed in Paris in gothic type, this edition closely follows the 1498 edition also reprinted and published in 1508 by the same Petit under the title Uberrimum Sphere mundi commentum, intersertis etiam questionibus Petri de Aliaco. In Cirvelo's commentary, he mentions how in 1491 (sic) King Ferdinand sent out sailors to the westward to seek new islands and how they returned with examples of many strange birds, exotic unguents and spices, and gold, and bringing strange blue men with square heads. For a long time this work was not recognised as an early Americanum, and it does not appear in Harrisse, JCB or Sabin. - Visit our website for additional images and information. Seller Inventory # 003071

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