Engineering

1650 — Large 4to. 2 parts in one volume. (8), XXXIX, (1), 307, (1) pp. (4), 309-633, (3) pp. With woodcut vignette to both title pages, several woodcut illustrations in the text, and printer's device on last leaf. Fine contemporary French éventail leather binding. Wants ties. Second, posthumous edition. Previously, Montebruni (1597-1644) had published his "Ephemerides" for the years 1640-45 and 1645-60. "D'apres les tables de Lansberg, pour le méridien de Bologne. Dans la part I de la publication, il y a un catalogue d'étoiles, réduites à 1630" (Houzeau/L.). - Edges, corners and spine-ends professionally restored. Sumptuous giltstamped éventail-style binding: double borders of a narrow zig-zagging design and a wider rosette-and-flower-design within floral braces and double fillets enclose a large central compartment, the corners of which are occupied by round-headed pointillé fans emanating from tendril corner stamps. The same éventail stamps form an elaborate central rosette with tendril stamps at top and bottom ends. The empty space in between in filled in by intricate tendril and dentelle blindstamping. The various elements of the design are starkly set off by empty quarter-inch fillet borders enclosing the corner éventails with quadrants and the central rosette with a lozenge; the tendril infilling is structured by the same blank borders forming a cross, thus dividing the cover into four richly tooled, mirroring quarters. The spine is framed by the same zigzag and floral borders as the covers, enclosing a narrow blank border and a finely tooled dentelle and semi-rosette design echoing the cover infilling. - Title page bears 1772 ms. note of ownership by the Capuchin monk Giovanni da Cento, who introduced the volume to his monastery's library in Cento (Emilia-Romagna). Later in the library of the Swedish collector Thore Virgin (1886-1957) with his repeated signature (dated Stockholm, 16 May 1914) and his bookplate (dated 1911) and collection stamp ("Bibliotheca Qvarnforsiana"). Additional bookplate of Rolf Wistrand. Riccardi II, 180, 2. Houzeau/Lancaster 15161. OCLC 68956764. Lalande 211 ("1640").