PEUERBACH, Georg (1423–1461). Theoricae novae planetarum. Edited by Erasmus Reinhold. [Wittenberg: Johann Lufft, 1542.]

First edition as edited by Erasmus Reinhold, possibly a presentation copy from Reinhold to the mathematician Hartmann Beyer. In contemporary Thuringian binding.

Peuerbach’s Theoricae replaced a “brief and faulty” earlier treatise on Ptolemy’s geometric theory; Owen Gingerich writes, “What was new in Peuerbach’s little treatise was principally a set of diagrams showing how crescent-shaped zones of crystalline aether could fill in the spaces and thus make geometric units from Ptolemy’s eccentric circles and epicycles” before commenting on how the advent of printing cemented these images as “the standard iconography of the astronomical Renaissance.” (The Eye of Heaven, p. 143).

The present copy was apparently given by Reinhold to Hartmann Beyer, a German mathematician and reformer who studied at Wittenberg from 1534 to 1539. It passed by descent to Beyer’s son Johann Hartmann Beyer who corresponded with Kepler and is named in Kepler’s 1615 Nova Stereometria doliorum vinariorum.

Octavo (159 × 95mm). 73 celestial woodcut diagrams including 2 functional volvelles (first with 3 moving parts, second with four) plus 3 fold-out diagrams (few marginal stains and dampstains, lacking final leaf g8 following the errata). Contemporary blindstamped pigskin [EBDB r000325 from the H.G. workshop at Jena (w00426)], manuscript title on spine, recycled manuscript hinge reinforcement (hole through lower cover revealing edge of printed illustration on recycled paper board, three scratches across upper cover, rubbed and darkened at extremities with small loss lower corner). Provenance: early marginalia in at least two hands and with lengthy notes on front endpapers – Hartmann Beyer (1516–1577; ownership inscription on title-page: “D.M. Hartmanno Beyero | M.E. Reinh.d.d.” and) – Johannes Hartmann Beyer (1563–1625; ex libris inscriptions on title-page: “Ad bibliotecha[m] Joha[n]nis hartm. Beyeri: Fra[n]cof.”) – L.G.A. Larue (bookplate, 1952 letter laid in) – Owen Gingerich (bookplate).