Rare and modern books
Isaac Newton (1643-1727)
Optice: Sive de reflexionibus, refractionibus, inflexionibus & coloribus lucis libri tres
1706
8000.00 €
Hermes Rare Books Studio Bibliografico
(Geneve, Switzerland)
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Details
Description
DESCRIPTION:
In 4to (25.3 × 19.4 cm). [7] cc, 348 pp, [1] cc, 24 pp, [1] cc, 43 [recte: 47] pp.; 19 copper plates and a few schematic text woodcuts; Slightly occasionally browned, faint wet spots in the lower third of the leaf or upper edge of the side. Complete.
COMMENTS:
First Latin edition, first issue. Following the Principia, Opticks stands as Newton’s second most important work. Although much of it was written some thirty years earlier, it was finally published in 1704, shortly after Newton became president of the Royal Society. In this work, he outlines his key discoveries and theories related to light and color — including the composition of sunlight, how different colors refract at different angles, the development of the color wheel, the invention of the reflecting telescope, the first viable theory of the rainbow’s arc, and the phenomenon of interference, illustrated through what became known as Newton’s rings.
In the Latin edition of Opticks, Newton added seven new "Queries" to the sixteen already published in the English version, along with a two-page preface noting corrections he had made to the text. It was in these additional Queries (numbers 17–23 in the Latin edition; 25–31 in later editions) that Newton firmly advocated for the corpuscular theory of light, highlighting the challenges posed by the wave theory in an ethereal medium. Like the original English edition, the Latin version concludes with two papers in which Newton aimed to assert his priority over Leibniz in the invention of calculus.
Provenance: doctor Lorenz Heister's (1683-1758) name on the title page with his coat of arms ex-libris. Heister visited Oxford and Cambridge on a trip to England in 1710 and on this occasion also met Isaac Newton personally. - Bookplate Philipp Nathusius.
Bibliografia: DSB 10, 56 - Poggendorff II, 277 - Valais 179 - Babson 137 - Honeyman 2326.
