This image is a detail from an illustration in Jacobi Bartschii planisphaerium stellatum seu vice-globus coelestis in plano delineatus in quo breviter ac perspicue ostenditur, quomodo tam sidera praecipua, fixa pariter, atque erratica noctu in coelo quam maiores et minores sphaerae circuli ... opera et studio Andreae Goldmayeri. Norimbergae [1661]. To see the complete illustration (300 kB jpeg file) click here. To see the title page of the book (130 kB tiff file) click here.
Jacob Bartsch (1599/1600 - 1632/33), the author of this and other astronomical treatises, was physician and professor of mathematics at the University of Strassburg (Strasbourg). He was son-in-law of Johannes Kepler. (See J. G. Poggendorff: Biographisch-literarisches Handwörterbuch zur Geschichte der exacten Wissenschaften. Band 1. Leipzig 1863.)
The book is in the Oettingen-Wallersteinsche Bibliothek of the University Library Augsburg. This is a very rich collection of books from the 16th to the 18th centuries, including also science and astronomy. Use the searchable database (partially including images of title pages and illustrations) to find more old astronomy books. Typing in astro% gives 417 hints. The books are mostly in Latin, German, and French. Unfortunately, the WWW forms and instructions are written in German only. However, it is quiet easy to use the database following the examples.
The files are courtesy Universitätsbibliothek Augsburg.
The link to the Oettingen-Wallersteinsche Bibliothek can also be found at the History of Astronomy: Archives and libraries page.
Wolfgang R. Dick. Created: 6 Apr 1995 or before. Latest update: 17 Dec 1999
