Rare first edition of the most spectacular book by Athanasius Kircher,
“a richly illustrated work on the origin of languages with a principal focus on examining
the biblical story of the Tower of Babel, and on Egyptology.”
The 7 wonders of the world are represented in this superb book.
Kircher, Athanasius. Turris Babel, sive arcontologia firstly ancient post-deluge human life, manners and events greatness , secondly, Secundo Turris construction and building confusion, of languages the First… the First patron In-folio with 1 frontispiece, (7) ff., 219 pp., (13) pp., 4 double-page plates out of text, 4 full-page plates in the text, 5 folding plates out of text, 3 full-page plates out of text, numerous engravings in the text, printed in 2 columns, rare browned leaves, small tear in the center of the large folding plate without missing parts. Half red leather, combed boards, spine with raised bands with handwritten title piece, untrimmed..
In-folio with 1 frontispiece, (7) ff., 219 pp., (13) pp., 4 double-page plates out of text, 4 full-page plates in the text, 5 folding plates out of text, 3 full-page plates out of text, numerous engravings in the text, printed in 2 columns, rare browned leaves, small tear in the center of the large folding plate without missing parts. Half red leather, combed boards, spine with raised bands with handwritten title piece, untrimmed.
18th century binding. Reliure du XVIIIe siècle.
404 x 255 mm.
Rare original edition sumptuously illustrated of this “richly illustrated work on the origin of languages with a principal focus on examining the biblical story of the Tower of Babel, and on Egyptology.”
Sommervogel, IV, 1069; Brunet, III, 668; Caillet, no.5795; DBS IV:1069:36; De Backer-S. IV, 1069,36; Wellcome III, 396; Dorbon, ne2391.
This book published by the Jesuit Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680) less than a year before his death is ‘ perhaps the most curious work of this prodigious scholar ‘ (Caillet).
It is one of Father Kircher’s most spectacular books.
This remarkable and learned work on the Tower of Babel, its legend and architectural iconography, also deals with the various linguistic families to which the wrath of God gave birth.
The third book deals with linguistics and the propagation of the different language families to which the divine wrath gave birth.
‘In the 17the century, the Jesuit Kircher dreams himself of reuniting tattered Europe under a stable monarchy. He evokes, in the Turris Babel (1679), the confusion of languages and wishes to recompose a ‘grand universal history’ that could embrace all differences in a unified project assimilated to Christian doctrine. The Tower of Babel must allow men to escape a potential new deluge.’
The illustration includes a frontispiece engraved by Jan van Munnichuysen after Gérard de Lairesse, 12 plates outside the text (including 5 folding and 4 double-page) and 14 in the text (including 4 full-page), engraved on copper by Coenraet Decker, the pupil of Romeyn de Hooghe, from his drawings and those of Lievin Cruyl.
The 7 wonders of the world are represented.
In addition, there are some figures and hieroglyphs engraved in wood in the text.
Caillet particularly notes, ‘les planches ou figures de la Tour de Babel, which is admirable, the views of Babylon and Nineveh, the palace and arch of Semiramis, the mysterious Pyramids of Egypt, the Labyrinth of Thebes, the Colossus and the view of Rhodes, and the plate of the Speculum geneatheologicum sive Theotechnica hermetica, which is one of the most curious.’
Precious copy particularly large in margins because untrimmed.
