BIANCHINI, Giovanni

Tabulae de Motibus Planetarum

      Ferrara, 1475. Rare manuscript of one of the most sophisticated and widely disseminated 15th-century attempts to correct the Alfonsine Tables, by Giovanni Bianchini (d. 1469), an astronomer and business administrator attached to the Ferrara court of the d'Este, considered by Regiomontanus the greatest astronomer of his time. The work was known by both Regiomontanus and Peurbach, both of whom visited the author in Ferrara and corresponded with him; both made use of the present work in the computation of their own Ephemerides (Hellman & Swerdlow in DSB XV.474). Regiomontanus actually copied the entire manuscript in Vienna in 1460 (Nuremberg Stadtbibliothek MS Cent V 57), and extracts were possibly copied later in the century by Copernicus himself (Uppsala MS Copernicana 4, ff. 276-281), influencing him as well. The work also provides an unusual, to our knowledge singular example of the production of a scientific text from the court of Lionello d!Este, best known for the philology of Guarino da Verona and the appreciation of art and literature, famously documented in Angelo Decembrio!s De Politeia litterarum (written c. 1462; editio princeps 1540; 2nd ed. 1560)Understudied owing to its rarity, the work is representative of the technical revolutions in practical mathematics and geography on the eve of the Age of Discovery. The manuscript is divided into two parts. The first consists of an introduction and Canones explaining how the tables were calculated and how they are to be used. The remainder consists of the densely, if neatly written tables.Bianchini set out to achieve a correction of the Alfonsine tables!the standard in Europe for a couple of centuries by the time he wrote!with those of Ptolemy. He was a great admirer of Ptolemy and critical of the corrupted Ptolemaic and Alfonsine texts then in current use. Thorndike observes that historically: !many have erred by neglecting, because of their difficulty, the Alfonsine Tables for longitude and the Ptolemaic for finding the latitude of the planets. Accordingly in his Tables Bianchini has combined the conclusions, roots and movements of the planets by longitude of the Alfonsine Tables with the Ptolemaic for latitude, and with the rules of Ptolemy which Alfonso had employed too.! ! Thorndike ap. Tomash, p. 141 Although a significant number of manuscripts (at least in European institutions) and three printed editions (1495, 1526, and 1563) suggest that its contemporary circulation was far from negligible, its principal importance was its influence on such crucial texts as Peurbach and Regiomontanus, both of whom, as mentioned above, utilized Bianchini!s tables to calculate their own Ephemerides The most recent technical assessment of the work by Goldstein and Chabas concludes:Bianchini compiled a set of "userfriendly" tables that simplified the computations required for using the Alfonsine Tables. Many astronomers in the late Middle Ages (e.g., John of Ligneres,William Batecombe, John of Gmunden, and Abraham Zacut) also had this as a goal (each interpreting it in his own way), and Bianchini fits nicely in this group. Finally, there can be little doubt that early in his career Copernicus depended on Bianchini's tables for planetary latitude which, in turn, are based on Ptolemy's models in the Almagest. Hence, Bianchini's tables can be considered a source for Copernicus's knowledge of astronomy. ! p. 573.Provenance: Marco Antonio Scalamonte, most likely from the patrician family of Ancona, who became a senator in Rome in 1502; Robert Honeyman, Jr. (1928-78), noted US collector of scientific books and mss.; his sale Sotheby!s, London, Wed May 2, 1979 #1110; Alan Thomas Catalogue 43.2 (1981), to H.P. Kraus and to former owner; Martayan Lan, Summer 2008.Census: Although Boffito, Thorndike and Zinner, and Kristeller locate some few dozen mss. of Bianchini!s work in European institutions!not infrequently consisting solely of the tables, e.g., without the introductory matter!the only US copy recorded by Faye and Bond in 1962 was the present copy, then in the collection of Robert Honeyman. There was not then, and there is not now any copy of this manuscript in an American institution. In the same period, we know of a single other copy to come on the market, now in the collection of Erwin Tomash of Los Angeles, supplied by us. The work was occasioned by the visit of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III to Ferrara in 1452, and a copy, perhaps the dedication copy, in the Biblioteca Comunale Ariostea, Ferrara (Cl. I. No. 147) contains a miniature in which Bianchini is shown presenting the work to Frederick, with Borso d!Este looking on.* C.U. Faye & W.H. Bond, Supplement to the Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada (1962), p. 21, no. 12 (this copy)= Honeyman Collection of Scientific Books and Manuscripts Part III, Wed. May 2, 1979 #1110: $9840 (exclusive of premium); Tomash Collection (Catalogue in press) B150; Boffito, !Le Tavole Astronomiche di Giovanni Bianchini,! La Bibliofilia 9 (1908) 378-88; L. Thorndike, !Giovanni Bianchini in Paris Mss,! Scripta Mathematica 16 (1950) 69ff. & his !Giovanni Bianchini in Italian Mss.,! Scripta Mathematica 19 (1953) 5-17; Paul L. Rose, The Italian Renaissance of Mathematics, passim; Ernst Zinner, Regiomontanus. His Life and Works (1990); Bernard R. Goldstein & Jose Chabas, !Ptolemy, Bianchini and Copernicus: Tables for Planetary Latitudes,! Archive for the History of Exact Sciences, vol. 58, no. 5, July 2004, pp. 553-73; editio princeps of 1495: Stillwell I.29; BMC V.520; Goff B 697.. Manuscript on paper written in brown ink in a neat humanistic hand, with one illuminated coat of arms on first text leaf, signed by the scribe Francesco da Quattro Castella (near Reggio Emilia) on f. 150v., preceded by 4 blanks and followed by 6 more. Folio [33 x 23.5 cm], 150 ff., c. 37 lines written in a neat humanistic hand in brown ink, 2-3 line initials in red or blue, large illuminated initial and coat of arms of the Scalomonte family on first text leaf, flanked by floral decoration, 231 full-page tables densely (but neatly) written in red and brown ink; some marginal or inter-columnar annotations, and one extended annotation on final leaf. Watermarks: cf. Bricquet 3387 (ecclesiastical hat); Bricquet 2667 (basilisk). Bound in contemporary blind-stamped goat skin over wooden boards, sympathetically re-backed, edges of covers abraded and showing through to board. Some minor waterstaining in initial leaves and a little worming at back, but not affecting legibility. Generally in a fine state of preservation