Alphonsus X, 1492

ALPHONSUS X, King of Castile and Leon (1221-1284). Tabulae astronomicae. Edited by Johnannes Lucilius Santritter. Venice: Johannes Hamman, 31 October 1492.

Second edition of the Alphonsine Tables. "Alfonso X ('The Learned'), King of Castile and Leon from 1252-1282, sponsored translations of scientific works from Arabic into Latin and Castilian, the most important of which was a new edition of the Toledan Tables of the eleventh-century Cordoban astronomer al-Zarqali" (Norman 36). This work supplements al-Zarqali with a few new (thirteenth-century) observations but uses the same format and "retain[s] the Ptolemaic system for explaining celestial motion" (DSB). This edition includes Santritter's Canones in tabulas Alphonsi and an exchange of letters beween Santritter and Augustinus Moravus. H 869; GW 1258; Goff A-535; Klebs 50.2; BMC V 424; ISTC ia00535000.

Chancery quarto (205 x 153mm). 114 leaves. Decorative initials and head-piece ornaments (some soiling on title-page, partially erased stamp on A2, some modern marginalia on A3, a few leaves lightly toned). Modern flexible vellum. Provenance: Owen Gingerich (bookplate).