(AUCTION CATALOGUE: HOOKE, Robert) Bibliotheca Hookiana. Sive Catalogus Diversorum Librorum: viz. Mathematic. Philosophic. Medicorum, Philologicor. Hist. Natural. Navigat., &c....
Quorum Auctio habenda est Londini, in Edibus vulgo dictis Inner Lower-Walk, in Exeter-Exchange in the Strand, the 29th of April, 1703. Per Edoardum Millington, Bibliop. Londin. 2 p.l., 56 pp. 8vo, cont. vellum-backed blue boards. [London]: R. Smith et al., [1703]. The sixth known copy of the auction catalogue of Robert Hooke's wonderful library; I have been dreaming of owning this catalogue for many many years. With the sale catalogue of Robert Hooke (1635-1702), "we enter the world of modern science and perhaps one can call Hooke's the first really modern scientific library collected by a great scientist...there can be no doubt that Hooke was one of the greatest geniuses the world has ever known. His library well illustrates his greatness... "Fortunately, we are fairly well informed about his activities as a book collector. His diary covering the periods August 1672 to December 1680 and November 1688 to August 1693 has been preserved and published. He was a passionate book collector and hardly a day goes by without his recording a purchase either at auction or from booksellers...He collated the books he purchased and he read them... "Hooke died intestate and his library was sold by auction on 29 April 1703. The catalogue has a preface by Richard Smith, publisher to the Royal Society and a bookseller often mentioned in the diary, where he draws attention to the scientific importance of the library and the fact that many of the books have notes by Hooke, perhaps an indication that the world realized that this sale was a particularly important event. In the sale there over 3,000 volumes (some doubtless containing several titles), a large library for that time. Approximately half were in Latin, very approximately 1,000 in English, 200 in French and 20 in Spanish... "The large majority of his books was scientific and medical, and this was a most unusual feature at this time...They form a superb collection on these subjects and even in his own time must have been most remarkable. None of the great names in his field is missing and Hooke by no means confines himself to books by his contemporaries, he had many sixteenth-century books; this again is an unusual feature for his time... "His other sixteenth-century books are nearly all in Latin...all the great names are represented: Aristarchus, Agricola, Ptolemaus, Cardanus, Porta, Regiomontanus, Oronce Finé, Bassantin, Bruno, Palissy, Dee, Durer, Agrippa, Paracelsus, Paré, etc. For the seventeenth century the collection is as complete as one could possibly wish... "The more general section of the library is also of the highest interest. Of course, the surveyor to London, an architect and collaborator of Wren had the great architectural books by Vitruvius, Palladio, Alberti and so on; as well as books on the theory of Art... "In English literature, the dramatists are well represented and, on the whole, the poets too...French, Spanish and Italian literature are well represented with most of their classic authors... "Hooke was perhaps the most brilliant representative of the passionate desire for the new knowledge and ideas of his century. There was at that time a daily social exchange of information on all kinds of subjects, and Hooke was at the centre of this work, his splendid library surely helping him in discussions on all conceivable subjects. His collection has an extraordinarily modern look about it and could well have been assembled -- if the books were available -- by a twentieth-century man of the widest culture and interests. This sale catalogue remains, I think, as a most vivid illustration of one of the most brilliant minds England has ever produced."H.A. Feisenberger, "Introduction," Sales Catalogues of Libraries of Eminent Persons, Vol. 11., Scientists (1975), pp. 4-7. There are six known copies of this catalogue: two at the British Library, one each at the National Library of Ireland, Durham University Library, UCLA, and our copy. The first three have an additional ten leaves ("Appendix") listing a further 711 miscellaneous lots. A fine copy, marked with little dots next to many lot numbers denoting the holdings of the Macclesfield library or items bought by the Earl at the sale. Munby & Coral, p. 20.
$US49500
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