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Description
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GEBER De alchimia libri tres. Eiusdem liber investigationis perfecti magisterij, artis alchimicae. Lis additus liber trium verborum. Epistola item Alexandri Imperatoris, qui primus regnavit in Graecia. Parsarum quoque exitit Imperator: Super eadem re. [colophon:] Strasbourg, Jean Gruninger, 29 August 1531. Folio, 120p with large title woodcut and numerous large Woodcut illustrations; a good, large copy, washed, in modern vellum. Extremely rare, and finely illustrated edition of this famous work, also known under the title Summa perfectionis. This was the last work printed by Gruninger, famous for his illustrated books: the title woodcut here is probably by Wechtelin. Gruninger first issued it in 1529, an edition which appears to be even rarer than the present one. Gruninger's is the first illustrated edition of Geber. Centainly, De alchimia and the other works of the Geberian corpus were of greatest influence on Western chemistry and "whether they by translations or elaborations, they represent the amount of Arabic chemical knowledge made available to Latin reading people toward the end of the thirteenth century" (Sarton II, p. 1044). DAB, 7, 37-39; EI, II, pp. 357-59; Sezgin, IV, pp. 132-269. BMSTC German Books p. 434; Ritter, Bibliotheque Nationale de Strasburg 937; NUC records only one location, Yale University. |
