Libro segundo de arithmetica que trata de proporción, y regla de tres y monedas, pesos antiguos, con otras cosas tocantes al arte menor y mayor

Pérez de Moya, Juan

1557. Salamanca. Juan Canova. 8vo, (140 x 88 mm). 87 ff., 1 ff. (colophon), 1 ff. at end with a contemporary manuscript inscription, numerous geometrical woodcuts in text. Fine nineteenth century calf, spine with title and decorative devices in gilt, boards ruled in gilt, gilt dentelles, mottled pastedowns, all edges tinted red, blind supralibros of Stirling-Maxwell to covers. Lightly toned, some scattered inconsequential foxing, overall very good.

First edition, one of the rarest 16^th century Spanish books on arithmetics, by one of Spain´s most renowned authors, Perez de Moya, known in two other copies only, none of which in the United States, and of two that are complete. 

 

The Libro segundo de arithmetica deals with algebra a year before his Compendio de la Regla de la Cosa o Arte Mayor (Burgos, 1558), which is currently believed to be the second work on algebra after Marco Aurei’s Libro primero de aritmética algebraica, published in Valencia in 1552. 

 

The Libro segundo de arithmetica of 1577 also deals with the assaying of gold and silver (pp48v – 59r), a subject of great practical importance in a period when New World mines yielded large amounts of gold and silver for Spain.  It is one of the earliest texts in Spanish on this topic. He also deals with the accounting practices of companies and the use of geometry for measuring terrain.

 

History of publication of books by Perez de Moya:

The first recorded work that Pérez de Moya published was the Libro de cuenta, que tracta de las quatro reglas generales de arithmética, práctica, por números enteros, y quebrados, y de reduciones de monedas (1554, Toledo, by Juan Ferrer). In the dedication of the Libro segundo de arithmetica, which is addressed to Diego de Benavides, Perez de Moya claims that he had previously dedicated other books on “aritmética” to the Conde de Santiesteban del Puerto, there are however no records of these works. The the Libro de cuenta is today the only known work by Moya printed before the Libro segundo de arithmetica.

 

Provenance: William Stirling-Maxwell, his bookplate on front pastedown; Joan Gili.

 

Extremely rare: only 2 library copies traced, one at the Biblioteca Pública del Estado, Mahón (copy lacking title page and described as ´muy deteriorado’), and the Biblioteca Central.

 

IB 14634; Ruiz Fidalgo, Salamanca 481. Not in Palau. Not in OCLC, not in Smith Rara arithmetica.

 

Garza Merino, Sonia, ‘El Tratado de matemáticas de Juan Pérez de Moya en la imprenta’, in López-Vidriero Mª Luisa and Cátedra, Pedro M.(Eds), La Memoria de los Libros Estudios sobre la historia del escrito y de la lectura en Europa y América, Salamanca, Instituto de Historia del Libro y la Lectura Fundación Duques de Soria  Fundación Germán Sánchez Ruipérez, 2004, vol I, pp.435-462, p. 437 note 3.

1557

$18,000.00