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Gaubil, Antoine
Catalogue Chinois des Étoiles, Autograph manuscript, [Beijing, 1734].
Unrecorded celestial atlas, made by a Jesuit missionary in China.
An unrecorded manuscript celestial atlas from the Sui dynasty, edited with an extensive commentary by the early 18th century Jesuit astronomer Antoine Gaubil, hailed by Joseph Needham as the “the interpreter general and father superior of Chinese astronomy”, of which this manuscript gives impressive evidence. The manuscript contains an unpublished translation of the “Bu Tian Ge” (a.k.a. “Songs of pacing the heavens” or “The song of the marches of the heavens”), a Sui dynasty (581-618 CE) star catalogue in verse by the Taoist hermit Dan Yuanzi, also known as Wang Ximing. Beyond the text of the star catalogue, Gaubil provides his ink- drawn copies of 31-star charts, including a fold-out celestial map of the north polar region. Gaubil provides an extensive commentary on the text, and a tabular catalogue of Chinese stars that allows us to determine the corresponding European stars based on their distance from the North Pole.
An unrecorded manuscript celestial atlas from the Sui dynasty, edited with an extensive commentary by the early 18th century Jesuit astronomer Antoine Gaubil, hailed by Joseph Needham as the “the interpreter general and father superior of Chinese astronomy”, of which this manuscript gives impressive evidence. The manuscript contains an unpublished translation of the “Bu Tian Ge” (a.k.a. “Songs of pacing the heavens” or “The song of the marches of the heavens”), a Sui dynasty (581-618 CE) star catalogue in verse by the Taoist hermit Dan Yuanzi, also known as Wang Ximing. Beyond the text of the star catalogue, Gaubil provides his ink- drawn copies of 31-star charts, including a fold-out celestial map of the north polar region. Gaubil provides an extensive commentary on the text, and a tabular catalogue of Chinese stars that allows us to determine the corresponding European stars based on their distance from the North Pole.
Folio (250 x 328 mm). French manuscript on oriental paper. 78 (bound in reverse order), 3 pp. With 31 maps of stars and constellations, including 1 large fold-out diagram (ca. 540 x 435 mm). Modern quarter morocco, title in gilt on spine. Well preserved, the fold-out shows minor browning and creases.
Provenance: The library of Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872); Sotheby’s, London, 2023.
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