Serrano - Almanak y pronostico universal : diario de quartos de luna para este año de 1764. Barcelona : por - 1764

"Forecasts and calendars, within what is considered 'popular literature', are the favorite reading of the popular classes of the Iberian Peninsula during the 18th century. At first one should distinguish between forecast-divination and almanac, but in general they complement each other. These astrologers or predictors styled themselves as 'piscatores'. They moved in the field of prediction, universal astrology, and fantastical tales. The structure of the 'almanaques' is fairly uniform across authors. All works begin with the dedication and the various censures and licenses, to continue with an introduction or prologue and subsequently analyze the seasons, computations of the year, numbers of the year, movable feasts, the solar cycle, eclipses, the forecast for all months and days of the year, etc." - Cobos Bueno y Vallejo

Villalobos, Jérónimo Audije de la Fuente y Hernández: El piscátor de Guadalupe. Editamas, 2014.
"Almanaques, lunaries, forecasts, ephemerides, calendars… Many names and uses have had these 'guides to time' throughout their history. The social utility of these publications has been incredibly important in some periods of our history, and peering into this genre of popular literature and science gives us a unique opportunity to understand forms of diffusion of scientific knowledge in the society of the moment. Thus we can see astronomy, astrology, history, agricultural practices, natural remedies or popular proverbs, all mixed in a sometimes curious amalgam of academic and popular wisdom" – Elena Sánchez Nogales, Forecasts and Almanacs of the 18th and 19th Centuries in the Biblioteca Digital Hispánica. National Library of Spain.

Rarissima edition, printed in Barcelona in 1764, of the "Almanak, universal forecast and daily of the quarters of the Moon. Composed by the great Andalusian astrologer Mr. Gonzalo Antonio Serrano". This very interesting 16-page booklet contains the astrological predictions "for this year 1764".

"Gonzalo Antonio Serrano (Cordoba, 1670-1761) was a physician, mathematician and astronomer of the 18th century born in the Cordoban neighborhood of San Lorenzo. A student of eclipses, he published a book called the 'Filípic Tables, Catholic or General [Tables] of the movements of eclipses'. For the study of these eclipses he sometimes used the Torre de la Malmuerta, in Córdoba. As a physician he stood out for his diligence in compiling Andalusian medicine. He wrote other works of scientific outreach such as 'Apología Pacífica Medio Práctica' and 'rayos luminosos de Apolo' and 'Teatro Supremo de Minerva'" - Wikipedia

Delightful astrological engraving with typographic brand on the cover. Lovely binding in parchment reusing a fragment of a 17th-century chant manuscript in two inks. Strong and solid. This practice of recycling ancient manuscripts for binding, very common in the history of the book, is known to codicologists as 'membra disiecta' (scattered fragments). Text in Spanish. 15.5 x 11 cm, 25 grams. 16 pages. Complete copy. It is an extremely rare work. Only 2 copies in Spanish libraries according to the CCPB (Colective Catalogue of Bibliographic Heritage), kept in the Library of the Centre Excursionista of Catalonia (signatura B-CEC, C XVIII Ser) and in the Sabadell Historical Archive (signaturta B-S-AH, D3-13320).

Serrano, Gonzalo Antonio (1670-1761), Almanak y pronostico universal : diario de quartos de luna para este año de 1764 : las fiestas que son de precepto ván con este señal [cruz de Malta], las que se puede trabajar oyendo missa con este [cruz latina] y los feriados de la Real Audiencia con este... Compuesto por el gran astrólogo andaluz D. Gonzalo Antonio Serrano. Barcelona : por Pablo Campins, 1764.

"The Spanish eighteenth century witnesses an extraordinary rise of almanacs or astrological forecasts, following the success of the formula created by Diego de Torres Villarroel, very imitated since the 1730s. What were brief functional booklets with the annual calendar and their astrological predictions become longer and more ambitious pieces of literary content or didactic dissemination. This process reaches its peak in the 1850s and then declines until its practical extinction by the late 1860s, but it has generally been forgotten in Spanish cultural history, due to prejudices against astrology, the misunderstanding of its context, and the modest, jocose or popular nature of almanac production" - Fernando Durán López, Tras Las Huellas de Torres Villarroel: Quince Autores de Almanaques Literarios y Didácticos Del Siglo XVIII. Iberoamericana Editorial Vervuert, 2022

"PISCATOR. General forecast, which usually comes out every year. It took the name of an ancient Milanese astrologer, who brought to light his Forecast under the name of Piscatró de Sarrabal: and they are distinguished now with the name Piscator de Andalucía, de Salamanca, etc." - Dictionary of Authorities - Volume V (1737)