Zurat ha-Aretz, Abraham ben Hiyya ha-Nasi, Offenbach: 1720

68 leaves (8 1/4 x 6 1/4 in.; 210 x 160 mm).Complete, [(2),1-41,(2),43-64,(1)]. Heavily illustrated with numerous diagrams, head- and tail-pieces, running titles flanked by printer's ornaments, illustrated title page; this copy with three rare original printer's corrective inserts pasted in the sixth quire at ff.21r, 21v, 22r. Owners' notes and library stamp on title page; cropped, not affecting text or illustrations; first and final leaves soiled; final leaf strengthened at gutter;  some foxing, lightly stained. Later vellum over paper boards.

B. Barry Levy, Planets, Potions and Parchments: Scientific Hebraica from the Dead Sea Scrolls to the Eighteenth Century, Montreal 1990, pp. 22-24; Shlomo Sela, 'Abraham bar Hiyya's Astrological Work and Thought', Jewish Studies Quarterly 13 (2006), pp. 128-158; Vinograd, Offenbach 44

Abraham bar Hiyya (c. 1065- ca. 1140) was an important medieval Spanish Jewish scientist whose writings on philosophy, astrology, mathematics and ethics were well-known throughout the Middle Ages by Jews and non-Jews alike.  Zurat ha-Arez (Form of the Earth), was originally conceived as part of a larger work called Hokhmat ha-Hizzayon. Together with the second part, Heshbon Mahalekhot ha-Kokhavim (Calculation of the Courses of the Stars) this work is considered the first exposition of the Ptolemaic system in the Hebrew language. 

In the preface Abraham modestly states that, because none of the scientific works, such as existed in Arabic at the time, was accessible to his brethren in France, he felt called upon to compose books which, though containing no research of his own, would help to popularize knowledge among Hebrew readers.

Printed together with Abraham bar Hiyya's work is John Sacrobosco's Sphaera Mundi (On the Astronomy of the Spheres), translated by Solomon ben Abraham Avigdor of Provence and entitled in Hebrew Mareh ha-Ofanim (The Indicator of the Spheres), with notes by Mattathiah Delacrut, a Polish kabbalist whose students included Mordechai Jaffe.