Lot 785: FINÉ, ORONCE.

De rebus mathematicis, hactenus desideratis, libri IIII. Paris: Michael Vascosan, 1556

Condition Note:

folio (280 x 196mm.), ff. [6], 136, illustration : woodcut initials, woodcut diagrams (many decorated with florets), binding : seventeenth-century calf gilt with gold-tooled arms of Archbishop Léonor d'Estampes de Valençay on both covers [Olivier 1663], spine gilt in compartments, early printed leaves from a legal text used as board liners, one small wormhole in lower margin, extremities slightly rubbed

Mortimer, Harvard French 231; Smith p.279

Léonor d'Estampes de Valençay (1589-1651), archbishop of Reims from 1641

first edition of Finé's final and posthumously published work. This work has been commented on for its typographical beauty (Mortimer), and Vascosan, who had been involved with Le Peletier and his 'faddish' orthography, was no stranger to fine printing. His edition of Finé's De mundi sphaera (1555) and this book have decorative and illustrative material by Finé, who had previously worked closely with de Colines and Tory (cf. A.F. Johnson, 'Oronce Finé as an illustrator of books' in Selected Essays, 1970).