Joannes Baptista Horváth - Physica Generalis & Physica Particularis - 2 volumi - 16 tavole ripiegate - 1776-1777

Joannes Baptista Horváth – Physica Generalis / Physica Particularis – Tyrnaviae, Typis Tyrnaviensibus, 1776-1777. Fourth edition revised by the author.

Complete work in two volumes, comprising Physica Generalis and Physica Particularis by Joannes Baptista Horváth, professor of physics at the University of Trnava.

An important eighteenth-century treatise on physics and natural philosophy, extensively illustrated with 16 folded copperplate engravings, all present:
Physica Generalis: 7 folded plates, TAB. I-VII
Physica Particularis: 9 folded plates, TAB. I-IX

The plates illustrate experiments, scientific instruments, simple machines, mechanics, optics, hydrostatics, atmospheric phenomena, astronomy and other topics of experimental physics.

Physica Generalis covers, among other things, properties of matter, attraction and repulsion, motion of bodies, impacts, simple machines, pendulums, central forces, universal gravitation, astronomy, the Sun, the Moon, planets and comets.

Physica Particularis, on the other hand, includes sections devoted to hydrostatics, capillarity, light, reflection, refraction, diffraction, optics, heat, electricity, atmosphere, sound, water, the aurora borealis, magnetism, minerals and botany.

Collation

Volume I – Physica Generalis
Tyrnaviae, Typis Tyrnaviensibus, 1776.
Fourth edition revised by the author.
[12], 496 pp. + 7 folded copperplate plates (TAB. I-VII).
The final page of Errata notabiliora is present.

Volume II – Physica Particularis
Tyrnaviae, Typis Tyrnaviensibus, 1777.
Fourth edition revised by the author.
[8], 447, [1] pp. + 9 folded copperplate plates (TAB. I-IX).
The page of Errata notabiliora is present.

Total: 16 folded plates, all present.

Binding

Two eighteenth-century bindings in full leather, contemporaneous with the volumes, similar in period and decorative taste but not uniform.

Spines with raised bands and rich floral decoration stamped in gold and red leather inlays with the title; second inlay bearing the author’s name.

In the first volume the spine and inlays are oriented opposite to the text block, a peculiarity of the binding,

The endpapers of the two volumes are different: the second volume preserves endpapers decorated with red floral motifs.

Conditions

Overall well-preserved copies.

Interior generally clean, on strong eighteenth-century paper, with normal light browning, small stains and occasional traces of use compatible with age.

The 16 folded plates are complete, well-engraved and generally in good condition, with the usual editorial creases and some slight signs of time.

Bindings solid but with abrasions, scuffing and leather wear, especially on the boards, edges and spine ends. Gold tooling still largely preserved.

In the first volume there are ancient manuscript ownership notes and a library stamp. The second volume does not show the same stamp. The different endpapers and some binding differences suggest the two volumes may have had separate provenance histories before being joined as a pair.

No text or plate missing reported.

A complete work and of particular interest to collectors of the history of science, eighteenth-century physics and scientific instruments.