Item #2565 Elementorum. EUCLID, FEDERICO COMMANDINO.
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum
Elementorum

Elementorum

“One could argue that it was Commandino's translating activity that made possible the rapid recovery of Western mathematics in the sixteenth century."
– Encyclopedia of the Scientific Revolution


RARE HISTORICALLY-IMPORTANT EDITION OF THE WORLD’S MOST INFLUENTIAL MATHEMATICAL TREATISE: THE FIRST "COMMANDINO" EDITION.

Having established himself as a noted scholar, Federico Commandino of Urbino at the behest of his pupil Prince Francesco Maria translated into Latin Euclid’s Elements, configuring it into 15 books and adding extensive commentary. A gorgeously printed work, profusely illustrated with 865 in-text diagrams, Commandino’s edition, first published in 1572, was “made use of by subsequent editors for centuries” (Thomas-Stanford).

EUCLID; COMMANDINO, FEDERICO. Euclidis Elementorum Libri XV. Unà cum Scholijs antiquis. A Federico Commandino Urbinate nuper in Latinum conversi, commentarijsq’ue quibusdam illustrati. Pesaro: [Camillo Franceshini], 1572. First edition. Folio (8.5 x 13 in; 216 x 330 mm); *,**6, A–Z, Aa–Zz, Aaa–Sss4: [12] (title-page, papal authorisation, dedication to Prince Frederico Maria of Urbino, contents), 255 ff., [1]. Bound in early eighteenth-century calf-backed decorated boards. With broad woodcut title page border by J. Chrieger, and woodcut illustrations throughout text and historiated initials at the start of each book. Ff. [100] and [192] misprinted as “110” and “129”, respectively. Repair to hinge of title-page, some foxing and soiling to title-page, with tear (4 ¾ x 1 in) repaired later paper along right of bottom edge just clipping line of boarder, faint evidence of early stamp on top right margin; tear to bottom corner of f. 49; occasional foxing (most significant on ff. 38–39, 94–95, 146–47, 229, 232), otherwise crisp text throughout with extremely large margins. Thomas-Stanford 18.

References:

Dennistoun, James, Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino, 3 vols. (London: Bodley Head, 1909), III

Encyclopedia of the Scientific Revolution, ed. by Wilbur Applebaum (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2005)

Thomas-Stanford, Charles, Early Editions of Euclid’s Elements (London: Bibliographical Society, 1926).

Price: $7,800 .