Item #5907 Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum. Ignace-Gaston PARDIES.
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum
Rare Pardies Large Folio Celestial Atlas of 1674
In Contemporary Handcolor Heightened with Gold (the stars)
With a Chart of the Stars of the Southern Hemisphere
[Astronomy].
Paris, G. Vallet (engraving) and S. Mabre-Cramoisy (letterpress), 1674.

Globi coelestis in tabulas planas redacti descriptio, auctore R. P. Ignatio Gastone Pardies Societatis Jesu mathematico. Opus postumum.

Folio [52.5 x 39.4 cm], (1) f. letterpress title page, (1) f. engraved portrait, (2) pp. letterpress dedication including a large engraved headpiece of astronomical instruments and an engraved initial depicting a celestial globe, and 6 double-page engravings (with letterpress text in margins) in contemporary hand color with stars, nebulas and comets in gold. Bound in contemporary sprinkeled calf, gold-tooled spine and board edges. Old repairs to board edges and to extremities of spine. Small worm track in the first leaves not affecting the star charts, the occasional generally marginal minor stain, mend entering upper left corner of plate 2.

Very rare first edition of the Jesuit scientist Ignace-Gaston Pardies’ (1636-73) beautifully engraved folio celestial atlas, here in a deluxe copy with its 6 double-page charts in fine contemporary hand-color and its some 1500 stars, nebulae and comets individually illuminated in gold. Examples of the atlas typically consist of only the star charts, but the present copy is an especially rare issue including a letterpress title page, a separate dedication leaf, and a full-page portrait of the dedicatee, Johann Friedrich, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg-Kalenburg-Grubenhagen (1625-1679), engraved by Robert Nanteuil (1630-78) after a painting by Jean Michelin (1623-96).

Pardies died in 1763, just before the atlas was finished, and so his project was carried to completion by the Jesuit scientist and missionary Jean de Fontenay (1643-1710), who added his initials to the dedication leaf to Johann Friedrich (this leaf includes a large, fine engraved headpiece of the Duke’s arms surrounded by astronomical instruments). The atlas proper consists of 6 large double-page engraved gnomonic charts with letterpress text set in the outer margins. The first chart includes Pardies’ own Latin dedication to the Duke, signed 1673, and the remaining charts have Pardies’ explanatory astronomical texts in Latin in the left margin and in French in the right margin. Stars are depicted in six magnitudes, and also charted are both nebulae and comets visible from 1577 to 1672. The final map is dedicated to the constellations of the southern hemisphere, first charted in 1595-97 by Pieter Dirksz and Frederick Houtman, including the Southern Cross, Indus (American Indian), Toucan, Peacock, etc. Pardies notes that his star positions are based on the observations of Riccioli, Bayer and Kepler, that he has included 1,481 stars (a handful of which are repeated), and that he is well aware that yet more stars recently have been discovered with the use of telescopes. His text concludes with information about novae observed since 1572.

“The basic style of Pardie’s maps was derived from the large globes issued by Blaeu in 1616-1622 … The published reports of their observations indicate that Jesuit astronomers throughout the world relied heavily on Pardies’ maps for obtaining the coordinates of both old stars and newly discovered ones. Furthermore, while using the maps they improved them by adding new stars and correcting the positions of old ones; many of these revisions were incorporated into the second edition [c. 1690] … Pardies’s maps served as a model for the gnomonic maps by Jonas Moore, Doppelmayer, Kordenbusch, and, in the nineteenth century, the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, and for Grimaldi’s maps of the Chinese constellations” (Warner, pp. 196-8).

The plates for the star charts were engraved and printed by Guillaume Vallet, and the letterpress type was printed by Sebastien Mabre-Cramoisy. Plates 1 and 6 carry Vallet’s imprint engraved at the bottom left of the plates, reading: “Voeneunt Parisiis G. Vallet Sculptorum Regium, via Jacoboea ad effigiem Ludovici XIIII, cum Privilegio” (plate 1, Warner’s issue 1A) and “Se vend a Paris chez Vallet Graveur du Roy rue St. Jacques au buste de Louis XIIII avec privilege” (plate 6). In the left margin of plate 6 is the letterpress imprint of Mabre-Cramoisy reading, “Parisiis, Excudebat Sebastianus Mabre-Cramoisy, Regius Typographus. MDC. LXXIV.,” but in the present copy Mabre-Cramoisy’s name has been pasted over with a letterpress slip reading “Guillelmus Vallet Sculptor Regius” (Warner’s issue 1a). The present example collates with the copy housed at the Bibliothèque municipale de Lyon.

OCLC records U.S. copies of the 1674 Pardies atlas at Linda Hall, Illinois (6 plates only), NYPL (5 of 6 plates only), Johns Hopkins (5 of 6 plates only).

* D. J. Warner, The Sky Explored, pp. 196-8; Sommervogel VI 203, 14; Pastoureau 365, N. Kanas, Star Maps: History, Artistry, and Cartography, p. 159; B. J. W. Brown, Astronomical Atlases, Maps & Charts: An Historical & General Guide.

Sold

See all items in Rare Books
See all items by