pdf - Roger Gaskell Rare Books

135 x 142mm. Tear in titleleaf repaired on verso. Light foxing, dustsoiling
and waterstaining to text, edges of last leaf frayed. Plates a little
soiled, shaved in the margins, several tears with slight loss, all mounted.
Binding: Nineteenth­century embossed cloth.
Provenance: Old owner’s stamp on title ‘Ring Out SaVen, Poel Sehn
N. G. No. [Wlled in in MS:] 270’ (transcription uncertain).
First edition, one of three diVerent states or issues. Another issue with
the same Wngerprint but ‘Michelsspacher’ in the imprint is VD17
12:649661B. The Wngerprint of VD17 23:257486C, also with ‘Michelsspacher’
in the imprint, shows that at least the Wrst gathering is re­set.
There were several later editions. VD17 1:077617C; Duveen p. 111.
Four densely engraved alchemical plates with a short text.
The dedication is signed by the publisher, Michaelspacher,
who is often assumed to be the author, but Ferguson points
out that Michaelsacher says in the preface that the author’s
name is concealed symbolically in the text. The plates are
by Raphael Custos (c. 1590–c. 1651) and ‘show alchemical
allegories in architectural settings, with the usual medley
of names, steps and symbols... The Wrst print is of a triplemitred,
bearded, and horned smiling beast framed in a
zodiac. The second shows the two men [shown at the foot
of the Wrst print] in various alchemical postures. The third
depicts a rose arbor enclosing a four­story fountain, all
observed by several submerged men and women waving
paddles at a pair of crossed Wery swords. The last is a magic
mountain with a temple in its bosom, displayed by crosssection,
also with a zodiac.’ (Hall, p. 13.)
The dedication is to Michaelspacher’s friend Johann
Remmelin, whose Pinax microcosmographicus he had
published in 1615 (this was anonymous lead ing to
Michaelspacher again being taken as the author, see below
no. 160).
This copy has good strong impressions of the plates,
overall in good condition in spite of the defects noted
above. Ferguson notes that the same plates are used in later
editions with successively worse impressions.
Ferguson I, pp. 135–6 and II, pp. 94–5; Manly P. Hall, ed. R.
C. Hoggart, Alchemy: a comprehensive bibliography of the Manly
P. Hall Collection, 1986, pp. 12–13.
137
MONTE­SNYDER, Johannes de
Reconditorium ac reclusorium opulentiae sapientiaeque
numinis mundi magni, cui deditur in titulum Chymica vannus,
obtenta quidem & erecta auspice mortale coepto; sed inventa proauthoribus
immortalibus adeptis.