pdf - Roger Gaskell Rare Books

ROuSSET, François (1535–1590 or later)
Exercitatio medica assertionis novae veri usus anastomoseon
cardiacarum foetus ex utero materno trans ipsas trahentis aërem
internum in suos pulmones motus respiratorii (contra communem
opinionem) tu[n]c non expertes, & illum cordi eum appetenti, suique
etiam tunc micantis motus compoti praeparaturos.
Paris: excudebat Dionysius Duvallius, sub pegaso, in vico Bellovaco,
1603.
8vo: 6
* A–M4 N2 (blank * 6), 56 leaves, pp. [12] 100 (i.e. 98) [2],
including the blank. Fleuron device on titlepage, woodcut headpieces
and initials.
Waller 8261.
167 x 100mm. Light soiling to titlepage of Wrst work.
Binding: Contemporary English calf, blind ruled borders to sides and
spine compartments, later lettering piece. Surface of leather very worn,
head and tailcaps chipped, joints cracked at head and foot.
Provenance: Joseph Fenton (c. 1565/70–1634) with his signature, motto
‘Sors mea mors’ and number ‘78’ in a rectangle on the titlepage; large
letter L stamped in gilt in upper spine compartment; pencil inscription
‘From the Bibliotheca Philippica’.
First edition.
A fascinating volume combining two exceptionally rare works, the Wrst the
only work of an English natural philosopher who was a supporter of Giordano
Bruno. It was published in Paris the year after Bruno was burnt at the stake.
The second work is the last work of the French physician François Rousset.
The volume was owned by a contemporary English surgeon, and probably
bound for him. Fenton’s library has only recently come to light and is
important for adding to the growing body of evidence that the the stereotype
of the uneducated surgeon (unable to read Latin) needs to be treated with
caution. The two works demonstrate the wide range of his interests, perhaps
more so than the selection from his library made by Sir Hans Sloane (now in
the British Library) would suggest.
Hill, Philosophia Epicurea (1601). Hill was a graduate, and for a short
time a fellow, of St John’s College, Oxford. He declared himself a disciple of
Giordano Bruno whose well­remembered visit to the university had taken
place in 1583, four years before Hill matriculated. Hill supported the main
cosmological ideas of Bruno – heliocentrism, atomism, the eternity of matter,
the inWnity of the universe and the plurality of worlds. After he left Oxford,
probably on account of his conversion to Catholicism, Hill became a member
of the circle of Henry Percy, ninth earl of Northumberland, the ‘wizard earl’.
Northumberland was himself interested in Bruno and had many of Bruno’s
works in his large library.
Hill’s work was published in Paris where he had Xed, perhaps taking fright
after learning that the Earl of Essex was plotting to seize Lundy Island and
declare himself heir to the throne.
‘Hill’s Philosophia epicurea, a sequence of 509 propositions in natural