HILDEBRAND, Wolfgang

by Wolfgang Hildebrand

£2,250 · Offered by Sokol Books

.An early edition of this curious and wide-ranging work on natural magic , by the obscure Hildebrand (ca.1571-1635), a near contemporary of Paracelsus, Cardanus and Comenius. His most successful work, it is arranged thematically and divided in four books. Taking magia as a general term for scientific pursuits such as alchemy, astronomy and even theology, it explores recipes for colouring the hair, improving the memory, making a man merry or melancholy. To see by night, one rubs one s eyes with the blood of a bat other secrets are to see marvels in one s dreams, not to get too intoxicated to quickly, to make men seem headless or with the heads of animals . The fourth book specialises in artificial magic and contains chapters on making steel pliant, on glass, fireworks, waters, artificial gems and an artificial flying dragon. . . ..Telle considered Hildebrand a cunning robber who compiled foreign texts and thereby achieved a literary achievement that was considered valid at the time . Much of the text comprises passages from other works, often quoted in the original language, including an extensive section of the Quaestiones from Kramer s Malleus Maleficarum . Other authors of note include Gesner, Albertus Magnus, Jan Baptists von Helmont. Although the majority of scientific, medical and alchemical literature at the time was in Latin, a large portion of the present work, remarkably, is written in German. This made the work more accessible and followed the popular humanist philo

• Binding: Hardcover

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