History of the Book

In this poster-sized work, the first publication of observations made with a microscope, Cesi and Stelluti studied the anatomy of the bee. The text includes classical references to bees as well as new knowledge, integrated in a tabular outline.

Greek writers compiled ancient stories of the constellations, often in poetic form, with memorable instructions for locating bright stars and zodiac constellations. Constellations of the zodiac contain the wandering courses of the planets and the annual path of the Sun.

Coronelli, a Franciscan theologian and astronomer who worked in both Italy and France, was a founder of modern geography and an influential maker of celestial and terrestrial globes.

This beautiful atlas fused artistic beauty and scientific precision.

In contrast to Piccolomini, who omitted constellation figures in favor of scientific accuracy, Bayer superimposed constellation figures upon the star maps without compromising positional accuracy. These figures were artfully drawn by Alexander Mair.

The Uranographia of Hevelius, the most detailed and influential celestial atlas of the 17th century, contains 54 beautiful double-page engraved plates of 73 constellations, and 2 oversized folding plates of planispheres.

In the Prodromus, Hevelius explained the instruments and methods used to produce the star catalog. Hevelius’ Gdansk observatory, “Stellaburg,” was the best in Europe until the later national observatories of France and Britain.

Accurate depiction of the topography of the Moon was accomplished by mid-century in this lunar atlas by Hevelius. It set a new standard for precision that remained unmatched for a century.

Manuscript copy by Hajime Terai from original written in 1765 by Ise; illustrations copied by Odani.

Medieval human dissection manual: Written in 1316 by a professor of medicine at the University of Padua, the Anatomy of Mondino was the most widely-used manual for human dissection in the middle ages.

In the most lavishly illustrated book of the 1400’s, solid spheres ceaselessly turn, carrying the planets and filling the universe between the outermost heaven and the central Earth.

In a 1611 book published by the Academy of the Lynx, the Jesuit astronomer Christoph Scheiner argued that sunspots are little planets circling the Sun like Venus. Galileo answered Scheiner with this book.

Publication of this work was widely anticipated as a guide to the “fountain of youth.” Hernandez enjoyed the reputation of being the “Pliny of the New World.” The result transformed Old World natural history.

This is the first publication of Aristotle’s biological works. While Plato emphasized astronomy as the ennobling science, Aristotle insisted that biology, including the study of even the lowliest organisms, is beautiful to one who understands natural causes.

Schreck helped Galileo show the telescope to the Medici family and others in Rome. Once he arrived in China, he wrote this work on engineering in Chinese.

University medical textbook: Ibn Sina’s Canon of Medicine became a standard medical text in European universities. Ibn Sina, or “Avicenna” as he became known in Europe, flourished around 1000.

In this book, Regiomontanus predicted the positions of the Sun and Moon for 40 years. He designed a sundial to work independently of one’s latitude, and a volvelle, or circular dial, to locate the position and phase of the Moon according to date and time.

Agricola described early modern mining and metallurgy practices throughout the German speaking areas of Europe. The remarkable illustrations make this work a paramount example of how abundant visual representations in the Printing Revolution transformed science and technology.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

Galileo’s Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina provides a modern example of the book arts. The outer case opens to show a smaller case, the size of a miniature version published a century ago. The 1967 edition fits entirely within the circumference of a nickel.

A “calendarium” contains predictions of the positions of the Sun and Moon for several decades into the future. Regiomontanus calculated their positions for 40 years beginning in 1476; Stoeffler for 62 years from 1518-1579 inclusive.

In this book, Galileo opened a “Controversy over the Comets” by attacking Grassi. Published under the name of his student, Mario Guiducci, it was actually written almost entirely by Galileo himself.

Medieval remedies and natural knowledge: An explosion of 16th-century herbals dramatically extended the “materia medica” tradition deriving from ancient writers, assimilating a vast increase in the number of known plants.

This work, first published in the year of Galileo’s trial (1633), contains the first use of microscopic illustration in a botanical work. Ferrari described many exotic plants, including limes, lemons and pomegranates, and citron, which he prescribed as medicinal plants against scurvy.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

The Geneva Bible was the first lay study Bible, written in the vernacular, portable, affordable, and designed with cross-references and explanatory notes for self-study. It was the Bible of Shakespeare, of the Puritans, of settlers in the colonies of New England, and of Scotland.

Munting’s natural history drew upon two editions of Hernandez, both the Lynx edition published in Rome in 1651 and an earlier printing in Mexico City (1615), known as the Quatro Libros.

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

Fuchs extracted the best knowledge available from Galen, Dioscorides and Pliny. Fuchs gave each plant a German name as well as the traditional Latin. He described nearly 100 northern European plants unknown to previous physicians.

From his new astronomy, using Tycho’s observations, Kepler calculated these tables of the positions of the Sun, Moon and planets. Kepler adopted John Napier’s recently invented computational method of logarithms, published in 1614.

This “theater of machines” parades 40 different machines for any kind of purpose, whether a lock on a river, a book press or engraving press, or a device to prevent smoke from filling a room.Unlike the writings of Lorini and Galileo, which included theoretical investigations on the principles of...

In a work entitled “On the Universe,” Aristotle argued that a 5th element, called ether or the quintessence, composes the celestial spheres that naturally rotate in place above the region where the four lower elements mix together beneath the Moon.

Servetus, an anatomist, astrologer, physician and polymath was an early proponent of the pulmonary circulation of the blood. In 1553, Servetus was burned at the stake in Geneva.

Featuring Galileo's Handwriting. This is Galileo’s witty and entertaining dialogue in defense of Copernicus. In the frontispiece, Aristotle and Ptolemy hold an Earth-centered armillary sphere (left). Copernicus holds a Sun-centered model of the universe (right).

Although Galileo eloquently championed mathematical methods in science, the main target of his wit and sarcasm in The Assayer was Grassi, a fellow astronomer, whose mathematical methods proved that comets move above the Moon.

The original 256K Macintosh computer was the first consumer-marketed personal computer to support mouse input and a windows-based graphical user interface.

An explosion of plant knowledge: Herbals provided much more than biology or natural history information; they offered guidance for health, nutrition and common remedies. Two of the most important early English herbals are John Gerard’s Herball, and this work by Gerard’s student, John Parkinson...

Four leaves of colored, interactive anatomical flaps appear throughout this popular anatomical textbook, which recapitulates the combination of art, engineering and anatomy in Galileo’s world.

Galileo’s mechanics demonstrated that projectiles follow a parabolic path. This is true whether the projectile is a cannonball, an arrow or a football. This set of four Japanese Samurai manuscripts, drawn on rice paper in the mid 1800’s, was copied by hand from mid-16th-century sources.