GANS, David (1541-1613). Nehmad ve-Na’im. Jessnitz: Israel bar Abraham, 503 [1743].

First edition of an astronomical work by David Gans, contemporary of Brahe and Kepler, and Rabbinic scholar. Only a portion of this work was published in Gans's lifetime: the Magen David of 1612. Here Gans argues against the Copernican system in favor of Ptolemy, whose system in his view derived from the Pythagoreans and to Jewish scholars before that. Gans’s unpublished works included books on calculating the Jewish calendar and on the moon and its phases.

Quarto (201 x 157mm). 82 leaves. Hebrew type. Title woodcut architectural border; woodcut astronomical diagrams (title stained, toned, some other minor stains, this copy without the Latin appendix by J.C. Hebenstreit, as often.) Contemporary calf, tooled in gilt (heavily rubbed, recornered, rebacked with old spine laid down). Provenance: various deleted inscriptions and pen trials to title and endleaves – illegible library stamp.