Robert Hooke’s Micrographia (1667) Last holiday season the American Museum of Natural History published Natural Histories: Extraordinary Rare Book Selections from the American Museum of Natural History. A book which allowed readers "a privileged glimpse of seldom-seen, fully illustrated scientific tomes from the American Museum of Natural History's Rare Book Collection." From Marcus Bloch's 12-volume encyclopedia of fishes (1782-1795) Now they are following up the book's success with a year-long exhibition, Natural Histories: 400 Years of Scientific Illustration from the Museum’s Library, focusing on images that were created in pursuit of scientific knowledge and to accompany important scientific works in disciplines ranging from astronomy to zoology....
Who the Heck is Herwart von Hohenburg?
The Mensa Isiaca. Engraved plate number onefrom Thesaurus Hieroglyphicorum.No copies have come to auction within the last thirty-five years. OCLC/KVK note only seven copies in institutional collections worldwide, only one of which is complete, in the Bibliothéque National - France. But another complete copy recently appeared out of nowhere and into the marketlace, unheralded, without fanfare.The book is Thesaurus Hieroglyphicorum, published in 1610 by Johann (aka Hans) Georg Herwart von Hohenburg (1554-1622). It is one of the earliest works on Egyptology.It is a book that profoundly influenced Athanasius Kircher, one of the most fascinating individuals of the seventeenth - or...
Thomas Edison’s Kindle-iPad Combo
Thomas Edison, beyond his inventions, was the Steve Jobs of his time. He developed innovative consumer applications from contemporary technology and materials and was a master at marketing them. People marveled at his wonders that made day-to-day living easier and more convenient, and hung on every word he had to say about technology and great, game-changing gadgets newly arrived and to come from his factories.Forget the Kindle or Apple's new iPad. The "e" in ebook stands for Edison.In the February 1911 issue of The Cosmopolitan (yes, that Cosmopolitan - long before it was Helen Gurley-Brown'ed into Cosmo) the Wizard of...
What Did Noah’s Ark Really Look Like?
When I have trouble falling asleep, I count animals marching into Noah’s ark. After three hours, I still have beasts to account for, long after sheep have schelepped into the cargo hold.I have no idea what Athanasius Kircher, the 17th century polymath, did when he needed to inspire the sandman; it appears that he was kept up all night speculating about everything concerning Noah.The procession of life into the Ark.He published the results of his obsession with Noah in 1675. Arca Noe was and remains the most detailed account of Noah and his ark from that period in scientific inquiry,...
This Is Your Brain On Books
There has been a spate of recent books covering new research upon how our brains work and the human decision-making process. Madeleine Bunting, at the Guardian, nicely sums up the science and its implications. It turns out that just about all of our assumptions about free-will, autonomy, and rationality in our choices and decisions are chimerical.I was reminded of this just the other day when I received the following note from a close friend and rare book collector with a Ph.D,, and who has been certified as sane. His first note limns an extraordinary find in which serendipity smiled upon...