KIRCHER, Athanasius (1602-80). Ars magna lucis et umbrae, Rome, 1646, folio, 38 engraved plates, diagrams and illustrations (lacks one leaf), modern half vellum. FIRST EDITION.

KIRCHER, Athanasius (1602-80).  Ars magna lucis et umbrae in decem libros digesta. Quibus admirand ae lucis et umbrae in mundo, atque adeò universa natura, vires effectusq. uti nova, ita varia novorum reconditiorumq. speciminum exhibitione, ad varios mortalium usus, panduntur. Rome: "Sumptibus Hermanni Scheus ... Ex Typographia Ludovico Grignani", 1646. 2 parts in one volume, folio (313 x 210mm). Additional elaborate allegorical engraved title by Pierre Miotte of Burgundy, woodcut diagram on printed title, a total of 38 engraved plates, including 3 folding and 4 engraved tables; woodcut illustrations and diagrams, some full-page, initials and ornaments, tables, blank leaf before engraved title, errata leaf at the end  with "Regestum" on verso (lacks table Rrrr1 [i.e. pp. 679-680], marginal tear to engraved title, wormtrack at upper margins of first few leaves up until [D3], occasionally affecting letters of running title, a few leaves browned, Lll torn without loss, one folding plate torn without loss, occasional light spotting, browning and staining, a few darker spots, a few short tears without loss). Modern half vellum, spine lettered in manuscript, modern endpapers (modern front free endpaper mostly cut away). Provenance: From the Collection of Peter and Margarethe Braune; later illegible institutional library stamp on title. FIRST EDITION, the second issue with 1646 on the printed title, of this important work on optics and the first on the projection of images. The author, for whom the term "polymath" might have been invented, was a mathematician, physicist, optician, Orientalist and musician in addition to being the first to employ the microscope in the  investigation of the causes of disease, the inventor of the magic lantern, the first to mention the physiological effects of colours and to issue charts of the oceanic currents. The present copy of this work, apart from the missing leaf/table mentioned in the description, collates otherwise complete. Some bibliographical references include some full-page letterpress tables as plates, accounting for the discrepancies in plate numbers called for. Becker 219; Brunet II, 771; Caillet 5770; Ferguson I, 466; Krivatsy 6396; Merrill Athanasius Kircher 7; Norman 1216: "Kircher compared the action of light to that of a magnet, examined the phenomena of bioluminescence and mineral phosphorescence ..."; Sommervogel IV, 1050; Wellcome III, p.394.