De circuli magnitudine inventa. Accedunt eiusdem problematum quorundam illustrium constructiones / Dissertatio inauguralis physico-anatomica de motu musculorum

Leiden / Basel: Johann & Daniel Elzevir / Typis Johann. Conradi a` Mechel, 1654. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. 1st Edition. Hardcover. 4to - over 9¾ - 12" tall. HUYGENS, Christiaan. De circuli magnitudine inventa. Accedunt eiusdem problematum quorundam illustrium constructiones. Leiden: Johann & Daniel Elzevir, 1654. [8], 71 [1] pp. Woodcut device on title, numerous woodcut diagrams in the text, errata on final page. [bound with] BERNOULLI, Johann I. Dissertatio inauguralis physico-anatomica de motu musculorum. Basel: Typis Johann. Conradi a` Mechel, [1694]. 20 unnumbered pages, woodcut diagrams to title-page verso, woodcut tailpiece and historiated initial. 4to (200 x 155 mm). Contemporary half calf over sprinkled boards, gilt-decorated spine with red morocco label lettered in gilt (rubbing to spine and extremities, corners scuffed), red-dyed edges. Provenance: Mme. V. Courcier, Paris (paper label to front pastedown), Thomas Moreaud (signed armorial bookplate loosely inserted). ---- I. FIRST EDITION of the Huygens' rare second publication. According to Beckmann a remarkable work. 'In his De circuli magnitudine inventa he approximated the center of gravity of a segment of a parabola, and thus found an approximation of the quadrature; with this he was able to refine the inequalities between the area of the circle and those of the inscribed and circumscribed polygons used in the calculations of Kpk p. The same approximation with segments of the parabola, in the case of a hyperbola, yields a quick and simple method to calculate logarithms, a finding he explained before the Academy in 1666-1667" (Beckmann). DSB VI, p.598; Beckmann, A History of Kpk; Willems 746. II. FIRST EDITION OF THE VERY RARE DISSERTATION by Johann Bernoulli the elder (1667-1748), which shows strong influence of Giovanni Borelli. Bernoulli's Dissertation de motu musculorum established muscular mechanics as a science and was important in the history of cardiology and circulation. A second edition was published in Venice in 1721. Borelli however issued a version of Bernoulli's thesis under the title "Meditationes Mathematicae de motu musculorum" as appendix to the third edition of his "De motu animalium", 1710. Wellcome, II, p.152; VD17 32:666232M; NLM/Blake, p.44 (2nd edition only).