Crescenzio, Proteo militare, Naples, 1595, contemporary vellum

CRESCENZIO, BARTOLOMEO

Proteo militare. Naples: Giovanni Giacomo Carlino and Antonio Pace, 1595

4to (199 x 150mm.), woodcut printer's device on title-page, woodcut initials and headpieces, woodcut and engraved illustrations, folding woodcut plate, contemporary limp vellum, lower blank section of title-page excised (containing part of inscription), a few illustrations shaved, quire V slightly browned, lower cover slightly defective at foot, upper hinge split, lacking two pairs of ties

The description of a versatile nautical measuring instrument, a forerunner to Galileo's compass of proportion (see lot 204). "As befits an instrument which was designed in the form of a dagger, there are also military uses of the 'proteo'. It is shown acting as a gunner's quadrant, and was intended to provide assistance both in ordering troops in formation and in setting out a military encampment. With the appropriate scales, it could also be used as a gunner's gauge" (The Geometry of War).

LITERATURE:

Cockle 942 (under Romano); Edit16 13744; The Geometry of War (online exhibition from the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford) 12

PROVENANCE:

"Domus S. Georgii...", early inscription on title-page; Thomas Francis Fremantle, armorial bookplate, purchased from Pickering & Chatto, 7 June 1899, £1-1s