Osservazioni ed Esperienze intorno al Bagno di Montalceto.
Large 8vo (20.4 x 13.7 cm). [12], 144 pp., full-page engraved portrait of dedicatee (facing preliminary p. [9]); quarter-page vignette on title, plus 2 large folding plates (29.5 x 26.5 cm and 35 x 28 cm); short closed tear on one folding plate, mostly outside plate mark. Bound in 19th century patterned papers, light wear at top and bottom of spine. Early inscription on title. Excellent. First edition of this balneological work on the waters of Montalceto, in the environs of Siena, and showing the characteristic tendency of 18th-century bath books to verge on promotional literature for what was, of course, a summer resort. The work is roughly equally divided between a chemical analysis of the local waters with their physiological implications, the usual antiquarian material, and further antiquarian material extolling the historic interest of the area—sufficient to warrant its inclusion in the standard bibliography of sources for provincial Italian history (Lozzi). The plates include: (1) a bird’s eye view of the bathing establishment’s principal buildings and the inviting Tuscan countryside; and (2) an architectural plan of the same. The vignette on the title-page illustrates invalids being taken into the bath. Also included is a list of the local patients and their ailments and how they were cured with the waters. Baldassarri was a Doctor of Medicine who operated a successful practice in Siena. He was also professor of natural history and botany at the city's university.
* Blake, p. 28; Lozzi, I.442.
Price: $975.00