EMPEDOCLES Σφαιρα, η Δημητρίιου του Τρικλινίου. Empedoclis sphaera. vel Demetrii Triclinii, senarijs versibus, an eruditiss. viris castigatis, descripta...E bibliotheca...Io. à S. Andrea Paris, apud Federicum Morellum, 1587
4to. 2 parts (Greek and Latin) in one vol. 10ff. Woodcut devices on title-pages, a little worming in bottom left and top right-hand corners with no loss of text, a little light browning, in modern marbled boards.
Second edition, second issue, of Empedocles’ poem on the Sphere, probably all that remains from his much longer poem entitled ‘On Nature’, edited and translated by Florent Chrestien using the manuscript now in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan. Empedocles of Agrigento (c.492- c.432 BC), the originator of the four-element theory of matter, was one of the most noted of the pre-Socratic philosophers, and more lines of his poetry (some 450) have come down to us in the form of quotation by later authors (Simplicius, Aristotle, Plutarch, etc.) than any other pre-Socratic writer. Little is known about his life and what little we do know is overlaid with legend by later writers. Galen referred to him as the founder of the Sicilian school of medicine and Aristotle called him the originator of rhetoric. His theories on the circulation of blood, the ‘big bang’ theory, and evolution are dealt with at length in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography.Adams E157; Hoffmann II, p.1; not in NUC; RLIN adds only the imperfect copy at Stanford.
£1350
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