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Science

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Science at Quaritch is broadly defined, ranging from medicine, anatomy, pharmacology (including herbals) and natural history to astronomy, physics, chemistry and mathematics.

An interest in the origins of modern chemistry has led to a specialisation in works on alchemy and distillation, and from there we have also branched out into occultism and hermeticism. We have developed an interest in gastronomy and books on nutrition and wine, an area which over the years has become one of our specialities.
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  1. RAIMONDI, Eugenio.

    Delle caccie … libri Quattro, aggiuntovi’n questa nuova ’mpressione il quinto libro della villa.

    [Naples, Lazzaro Scoriggio, 1626.]

    Second edition, expanded and extended, with a new series of striking hunting plates. The series of plates (attributable to Nicolas Perrey, who signs the title), showing composite scenes of hunters pursuing animals from birds and fish to lions and elephants, is wholly new, replacing the woodcut...

    £2500

  2. BENZI, Ugo; Giovanni Lodovico BERTALDI, commentator.

    Regole della sanità et della natura de cibi … arricchita d’un trattato...

    Turin, heirs of Giovanni Domenico Tarino, 1618.

    Scarce first vernacular edition of the works of the medieval Sienese physician Ugo Benzi (c. 1360–1439); an extraordinary testament to their enduring popularity into the seventeenth century, expanded with commentary and a new appendix on the abuse of alcohol and tobacco by the Turinese doctor Giovanni...

    £2500

  3. DVIGUBSKII, Ivan Alekseevich.

    Opyt estestvennoi istorii vsekh zhivotnykh Rossiiskoi Imperii … S izobrazheniiami zhivotnykh. [Fly-title:]...

    Moscow, University Press, 1831.

    First edition, rare, one of a series of six works on the flora and fauna of the Russian Empire, published 1829–1833 under the same general title. The present volume covers molluscs, including cephalopods and gastropods.

    £2000

  4. SAUNIER, Jean de, and Gaspard de SAUNIER.

    La parfaite connoissance des chevaux, leur anatomie, leurs bonnes & mauvaises...

    The Hague, for the Author and sold by Adrien Moetjens, 1734.

    First edition of Gaspard de Saunier’s most important work, the only one published during his lifetime. Gaspard de Saunier (1663 - 1748) established his reputation with the foundation of his equestrian academy at Leiden in 1707 and as riding master to the university there, having previously served...

    £1950

  5. PARKER, Thomas Netherton.

    Leaves out of the Book of a Country Gentleman.

    Oswestry, W. Price, London, Longman & co., and Shrewsbury, Eddowes & Leake, 1847.

    First and only edition of this very rare compilation by Parker of his farm and estate experiments and inventions, one of one hundred copies privately published, and presented by the author to the Earl of Powis.

    £1950

  6. MARINIS, Dominico de. 

    Dissertatio philosophico-medica de re monstrosa à Capuccino Pisauri per urinam excreta.  Plura de sanguinis...

    Rome, typis Iacobi Mascardi ... sumptibus Ben Carrarae, 1678. 

    First edition of this scarce dissertation on worms focussing on the extraordinary case of a Capuchin preacher from Pesaro who in 1677 passed a ‘monster’ worm in his urine, which upon subsequent examination was declared to be a serpent. 

    £1850

  7. [PHARMACOPOEIA.]

    Pharmacopoea Taurinensis nunc primum edita jussu Augustissimi Regis.

    Turin, Jean-Baptiste Chais, 1736.

    First edition of this Turin pharmacopoeia, prepared by doctors at the city’s medical college at the order of Charles Emmanuel III, Duke of Savoy. Its first section comprises a list of all substances generally used in the preparation of medicines, with synonyms and notes to aid the user in distinguishing...

    £1800

  8. [ANATOMY.]

    ‘Breve compendio anatomico’.

    [Italy, c. 1720.]

    A handsome set of apparently unpublished notes on orthopaedics by an anonymous medical student, compiled in Italy in the early eighteenth century, covering bones, cartilage, ligaments and muscles. The manuscript opens with a detailed analysis of the human skeleton, its bones and articulation,...

    £1750

  9. [ANON.]

    The Gentleman’s compleat Jockey, with the perfect Horse-Man and experienc’d Farrier, containing: I. the Nature of Horses,...

    London, Peter Parker, 1711.

    Fifth edition, very scarce, of an anonymous early farriery manual. Among the first popular guides to farriery, a form which would be much copied throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the Gentleman’s compleat Jockey (formerly attributed to Adolphus Speed) was first published...

    £1750

  10. [WALL, Thomas].

    A Second Christian Warning-Piece; wherein is shewed the first and chief Cause of Englands present Misery … Humbly...

    London, 1681-2.

    First edition, very rare, of a vehement anti-Catholic tract published in the context of the Exclusion Crisis; bound with the principal astrological work of John Holwell (a slightly imperfect copy).

    £1750

  11. ORIBASIUS. 

    Commentaria in Aphorismos Hippocratis … Ioannis Guinterij Andernaciis medici industria velut e profundissimis tenebris...

    Paris, Simon de Colines, 1533. 

    First edition of this commentary on Hippocrates, bound with a richly annotated copy of Galen’s works in the translation by Thomas Linacre. 

    £1750

  12. ÉCOLE DE MEDECINE DE MONTPELLIER.

    A collection of eighty-seven doctoral dissertations presented to and defended at the Medical...

    Montpellier, various publishers, 1800–1810.

    An extraordinary collection, bound up very soon after the last was published, of eighty-seven doctoral dissertations presented to the ancient medical school at Montpellier in the first decade of the nineteenth century.

    £1750

  13. CASAUBON, Meric.

    A Treatise concerning Enthusiasme, as it is an effect of nature but is mistaken by many for either divine inspiration,...

    London, R.D. for Thomas Johnson, 1655 [i.e. 1654].

    First edition of the first separate treatise on ‘enthusiasm’, a pioneering work of psychiatry avant la lettre and one of the most ground-breaking publications in a very public controversy. Of all Casaubon’s books, this has been shown as the most directly linked to the publication of John...

    £1750

  14. [ARNAULD, Antoine, and Pierre NICOLE.]

    La logique ou l’art de penser, contenant, outre les regles communes, plusieurs...

    Paris, Jean Guignart, Charles Savreaux, and Jean de Launay, 1662.

    Scarce first edition of the work known as the Port Royal Logic. The authors were leaders of the Port Royal movement, and the book displays the distinctive tone of earnest piety for which the movement became famous.

    £1750

  15. BOYLE, Robert.

    Tractatus … Ubi 1. Mira aëris … rarefactio detecta. 2. Observata nova circa durationem virtutis elasticae...

    London, Henry Herringman, 1671 [but printed abroad?].

    I. Second edition, very scarce. The first edition, published the year before, is known in less than half a dozen copies. An English translation also appeared in 1671.

    £1750

  16. [DONN, Benjamin.]

    ‘The Mathematicians Pocket Companion. Or a collection of the most valuable Theorems … The whole collected...

    [?Bideford], 1754.

    A comprehensive manuscript compendium on mathematics and its practical applications – including architecture, astronomy, book-keeping, dioptrics, hydraulics, mechanics, music, and shipbuilding – most likely compiled by the mathematician and mathematics teacher Benjamin Donn, with examples from...

    £1750

  17. [PARACELSUS.

    Aureoli Theophrasti Paracelsi eremitae philosophi summi operum latine redditorum tomus II … Basel, Pietro Perna, 1575.]

    [Basel, Pietro Perna, 1575.]

    The second half of a two-volume edition of the Latin works of Paracelsus (1493–1541), the great Swiss physician and alchemist, with profuse annotations by a number of early English readers.

    £1750

  18. [ALKEN, Henry.]

    The Beauties & Defects in the Figure of the Horse, comparatively delineated in a series of Engravings.

    Boston, Carter & Hendee, 1830.

    First American edition, the second and scarcest overall. ‘The dominant sporting artist of the early nineteenth century’ (ODNB), Henry Thomas Alken (1785–1851) ‘showed an early liking for depicting animals, especially dogs and horses’, and ‘demonstrated his expertise in the book The...

    £1600

  19. BOSE, Johann Andreas.

    Io. Andr. Bosii introductio generalis in notitiam rerumpublicarum orbis universi. Accedunt eiusdem dissertationes...

    Jenae, Johann Bielke, 1676.

    First edition of a pioneering work of statistics and rare Americanum, by the philosopher and historian Johann Andreas Bose (1624-1674). Bose’s crucial intuition as a student of human societies lies in his advocacy of interdisciplinary investigations. His work ‘on all the states in the world’ marshalls...

    £1500

  20. [GRANT, Charles, Vicomte de Vaux.]

    Recueil d’Essais, ou précis des opinions, et des mémoires, du Vte de *** …

    A Londres: De l’Imprimerie de T. Spilsbury & Fils. 1793.

    An interesting tract volume, containing the scarce collected thoughts of Charles Grant, vicomte de Vaux (a subscriber’s copy), a fine illustrated guide to Nîmes and the Pont du Gard, and three pamphlets relating to a controversy in the medical faculty in Edinburgh.

    £1500