PRIMUM MOBILE...TRIGONOMETRIA SPHAERICORUM 1609 GIOVANNI ANTONIO MAGINI

[MAGINI, Giovanni Antonio (1555-1617)]. Primum mobile duodecim libris contentum : in quibus habentur trigonometria sphaericorum, et astronomica, gnomonica, geographicaq́[ue] problemata, ac pr[a]eterea magnus trigonometricus canon emendatus et auctus, ac magna primi mobilis tabula ad decades primorum scrupulorum per utrumq[ue] latus supputata / auctore Io. Antonio Magino Pat. Inclyti Bon. Gymnasij publico mathematico. Bononiae [Bologna] : Impensis ipsius auctoris Anno MDCIX. [1609].

Three parts in one; leather-bound; softcover; folio (37cm x 25cm x 6cm); pp. [8], 104, [1], 105-107, 109, 109, 109-290, 182, 15 [i.e. 22]. Signatures: [a]2 b4 c2 A-4B4 4C6; A-K4 L6 M-2Y4 2A-B4 C2 D-F4. Latin text in Roman and Italic letter. Coeval full limp vellum binding with handwritten title on the spine; engraved title, woodcut diagrams, decorative capitals, head- and tail-pieces, tables and charts, colophon leaf at end. Condition: GOOD. Covers somewhat soiled, marked and cockled, with a small split to the upper joint. Perhaps lacking an initial blank but otherwise collates complete, first few leaves with staining and slight marginal wear, remaining contents largely very well-preserved, some minor creasing, remains of bookplate to pastedown and with a number of old biblioteca stamps throughout. Scarce.

Notes: Giovanni Antonio Magini (1555-1617) was a prominent Italian astronomer, cartographer, and professor of mathematics in Bologna, a chair for which he was preferred over Galileo in 1579. An admirer of Copernicus and a long-time correspondent of Brahe and Kepler, he proposed his own geocentric theory in 1589. His ephemerides, tables providing the position of celestial bodies in the sky at regular time intervals in the future, were first published in 1580, then periodically updated with new volumes. These works gained him international fame as an astrologer; during his life and well after his death, English and German almanacs were published under his name, and he was known as "The Italian prophecier".​ This work was originally published in 1604 under the title "Tabulae primi mobilis quas directionum vulgo dicunt". In 1607 he published in Venice the De astrologica ratione, ac usu dierum criticirum, seu decreeriorum; ac praeterea de cognoscendis et medendis morbis ex corporum coelestium cognitione (rest. Frankfurt 1608), a synthesis of "medical astrology". The present volume - a more demanding work - followed in Bologna in 1609. It was a development of the 'Tabulae Primi Mobilis' (Venice 1604), dedicated to Rudolph II, who had expounded the elements of plane and spherical trigonometry and given tables of the relative functions (but only for astrological use and with less accuracy). The tabular section has special title-page, with title: Io. Antonii Magini ... Tabulae generales ad primum mobile spectantes : & primò quidem sequitur Magnus canon mathematicus seu trigonometriae : nunc primùm ab auctore ipso auctus ..., and with imprint: Bononiae : Apud haeredes Ioannis Rossij, 1609, and colophon: Venetiis : Apud Gratiosum Perchacinum, 1609.​ [Tomash & Williams M18 (and M19-20); Houzeau & Lancaster 2753; Riccardi ii, 69; USTC 4033910].