Giuseppe Rosaccio, 1621

ROSACCIO, Giuseppe (c.1530-c.1620). Il medico ... Nel quale con brevita & modo facile si tratta della vertu de' Sali cauati dalle Piante Medicinali. Venice: Pietro Farri, 1621.

First edition of an unusual medical treatise by the eccentric cosmologist and cartographer Giuseppe Rosaccio. Its three books address astrological medicine, specific maladies and their remedies, and the distillation of pharmaceuticals from plants—each with its own title page within an engraved border. The author, Rosaccio, was a Venetian physician, astronomer, and mapmaker noted for his edition of Ptolemy and his speculative world geography entitled Discorso ... della Nobilita e Eccellenza della Terra rispetto à Cieli. Houzeau and Lancaster 5886; Krivatsy 9938; Wellcome 5565.

Quarto (224 x 160mm). Main title and two part titles in engraved borders, woodcut diagrams of distillation apparatus in third part (spotting, some dampstaining around the edges). Contemporary limp vellum wrapper with ties (spine worn with losses, apart from text block).