GALILEI, Galileo.
£53,950 · Offered by Sokol Books
.Rare first edition of Galileo's earliest published endorsement of the Copernican theory. Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) was one of the greatest mathematicians and astronomers of all time. His cutting-edge discoveries revolutionised early modern physics and eventually provoked the famous condemnation of the Holy Inquisition. Amongst many other acknowledgements, he was a member of the prestigious Academy of Lincei, a pioneering scientific fellowship established in Rome by Federico Cesi. Galileo wrote the .Istoria e dimostrazione .in the form of three letters to his fellow academician Marcus Welser of Augsburg.. . ..Based on telescopic observation of their motion, Galileo concluded that the sun rotated on a fixed axis like the Earth and other planets, thus embracing and somehow overstepping Copernicus's view. He also insisted that the newly observed sunspots appeared on the surface of the sun and were not its satellites, as the traditional Aristotelian interpretation suggested. In his usual combative tone, he maintained: 'this planet also, perhaps no less than horned Venus, agrees admirably with the great Copernican system on which propitious winds now universally are seen to blow...' His further discovery of the Satellites of Jupiter is described and illustrated with 5 plates. The work also includes Galileo's first written account of the phases of Venus and Mercury as well as some considerations on the many puzzling mysteries surrounding Saturn. His circumstantial approval of the
- Binding: Hardcover
Found via Rare Books Intel, a search across rare-book dealers, auction houses and marketplaces worldwide.