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Scheffer, Vitus, S.J.
Estimate
6,000 - 8,000 USD
bidding is closed
Description
Coelum Poëticum, seu Sphaera Astronomica. Prague: the widow Catharine Czernoch, 1686
4to (7½ x 5⅞ in.; 190 x 150 mm). Engraved allegorical frontispiece by Groot, 1 large folding plate (12 x 21 in.) composed of two engraved images comprising 12 celestial globe gores and including an armorial crest with the Imperial double-eagle and the letter "F" (the same crest found on the frontispiece); a few small fold tears in map, some browning heavier on a few leaves. Eighteenth-century tawed half-leather and boards, blue-speckled edges; some soiling.
4to (7½ x 5⅞ in.; 190 x 150 mm). Engraved allegorical frontispiece by Groot, 1 large folding plate (12 x 21 in.) composed of two engraved images comprising 12 celestial globe gores and including an armorial crest with the Imperial double-eagle and the letter "F" (the same crest found on the frontispiece); a few small fold tears in map, some browning heavier on a few leaves. Eighteenth-century tawed half-leather and boards, blue-speckled edges; some soiling.
Literature
Houzeau & Lancaster 178; De Backer-Sommervogel VII, 723; not in Warner or Stevenson
Catalogue Note
First edition of this exposition and allegorical interpretation of the constellations with their mythological background based on classical sources by a Jesuit of the Baroque era. Scheffer (1648-1717) also published a Biblia Immaculata (1711), a commentary on the bible which tries to find evidence of the Virgin Mary in both testaments. The present work is dedicated to Johann Mark Georg, count of Clary – Aldringen.
Very rare; only two copies have appeared at auction in the past 35 years.