Bode, Johann Elert

Uranographia sive Astrorum Descripto viginti tabulus æneis incisa ex recentissimis et absolutissimis Astronomorum observationibus.  Berlin: published by the author, 1801



Folio (25¼  x 18¼  in.; 642 x 464 mm).  Engraved double title-page with title and decorative border handcolored, preface and index table, 20 fine engraved double-page maps, 2 handcolored and 18 handcolored in outline; occasional minor marginal soiling or dampstaining.  Contemporary half calf, mottled boards, red morocco lettering-piece on spine; covers and extremities worn, head of spine chipped. 

DSB II: 220-21; Kenney 24; Tooley, p. 65

First and only edition.  "Bode's two sky atlases were for a long time indispensible tools for astronomers.  His Vorstellung der Gestirne ... contained more than 5,000 stars.  His later Uranographia 1801 surpassed all its predecessors by listing over 17,000 stars and containing, for the first time, the nebulæ, star clusters, and double stars discovered by William Herschel" (Kenny). Bode (1747–1826) was appointed royal astronomer in Berlin and was a member of the Berlin Academy for nearly forty years.  He taught astronomy and published important atronomical tables and other works on astronomy.

An attractive copy of a seminal work.