Helisäus Röslin, 1578

RÖSLIN, Helisäus (1545–1616). Theoria nova coelestium meteoron. Strausburg: Berhard Jobin, 1578.

First edition of Röslin’s first published work, with fold-out star chart. A contemporary and later rival of Kepler’s, Röslin “is mainly known to historians through his involvement in the controversy concerning the geo-heliocentric world-system” (Granada). Before this, Röslin wrote his first published text, A New Theory of the Celestial Meteoron, on the supernova of 1572 (“Tycho’s supernova') and the great comet of 1577: “Röslin maintained on the one hand that the comet of 1577, like the new star of 1572, was neither elementary nor sublunar but celestial and in ethereal regions. He even attempted what he declared no one before him had tried, to show that comets moved in regular orbits with poles and an axis. On the other hand he insisted that the new star of 1572 and the comet of 1577 were not natural phenomena but miraculous apparitions and divine signs of the approaching end of the world” (Thorndike).

Very rare, with one auction record on RBH. M.A. Granada, “Helisaeus Roeslin's Chronological Conception and a New Manuscript Source”, Early Science and Medicine 18.3 (2013).

Small quarto (213 × 156mm). Woodcut printers device and fold-out woodcut star chart (occasional marginal stains). Modern paper wrapper with slipcase, edges rubricated.