Information
PROMINENT MATHEMATICIAN PROMOTES HYDRAULIC ENGINEERING PROJECTS
[STEENSTRA, Pibo]. Aanmerkingen op de Verbetering der Ontlasting van Rhynlands Boezemwater op het Ye, en het project van doorgraaving uit de Wyker-Meer naar de Noordzee.
Amsterdam, Yntema and Tieboel, 1774.
WITH: [STEENSTRA, Pibo]. Vervolg der Aanmerkingen op de Verbetering der Ontlasting van Rhynlands Boezemwater in het Ye . Behelzende een onderzoek naar den eersten oorsprong van den gebrekkigen toestand van Rhynlands waterstaat, en van het bederf van het Noorder Spaaren. Als mede van de aanslyking van het Ye en de Wykermeer.
Amsterdam, Yntema and Tieboel 1774.
WITH: [STEENSTRA, Pibo]. Tweede Vervolg der Aanmerkingen op de Verbetering der Ontlasting van Rhynlands Boezemwater in het Ye. Waar in de onderlinge betrekking van de scheepvaart van Amsterdam over Pampus en voor de stad, met die van Noord- en Zuid-Holland naar en door het Spaarne, en de verbeetering van Rhynlands waterlozing op het Ye, uit de waare en natuurlyke gesteltenis van het Ye wort aangewezen.
Amsterdam, Yntema and Tieboel, 1776.
WITH: SLOB, Dirk. Redenen tegen het Droogmaaken, en voor het Bedwingen der Haarlemmer Meer, byzonderlyk, aan den kant van Aalsmeer; kortelyk voorgesteld.
Amsterdam, Yntema and Tieboel, 1766.
WITH: STEENSTRA, Pibo. Aanmerkingen ..., ter Opheldering van het Werkje van den heer D. Slob, ... wegens de natuurlyke oorzaaken van de steeds toenemende slikken van het Ye, ... vervolg der aanmerkingen en verbetering der ontlasting van Rhynlands boezemwater.
Amsterdam, Yntema and Tieboel, 1780.
WITH: STEENSTRA, Pibo. Noodig Bericht, ... wegens den Uitslag der gemaakte Werken, tot Verdieping van het Ye, voor Amsterdam.
Amsterdam, Yntema and Tieboel, 1781. 3 closely related works (1 in 4 parts) bound as 1 volume. Propaganda for (or in one case against) Holland's great civil hydraulic works. With 6 title-pages, 2 folding engraved maps, 5 woodcut diagrams in the text (mostly cross-sections), and title-decorations and tailpieces built up from cast rococco fleurons. Contemporary boards covered in green paper, green ribbon marker, marbled endpapers.
| Orders and Information | € 650 |
First and only edition of a closely related series of pamphlets intended as propaganda for (or in one case against) Holland's major proposed civil hydraulic works of the period 1766-1781. Steenstra discusses the reclamation of the Haarlemmermeer and the silting up of the IJ (here called the Ye) before the city of Amsterdam, arguing in favour of the proposed draining of the Haarlemmermeer (realized only in the years 1849-1852), while Slob opposed it. Though presented as scholarly treatises on the solution of the hydraulic problems posed by the silting up of the waterways, these pamphlets were part of an intense (pseudo)scientific exchange on the main problems of the Dutch water management, which was particularly intensified by the founding of several scientific societies in Dutch cities, especially in Haarlem and Rotterdam. Steenstra (ca. 1731-1788), born in Franeker, was lecturer in mathematics at the University of Leiden and the Athenaeum Illustre in Amsterdam, and took a very active and well-considered part in these sometimes vicious discussions. His letter to the publisher (with the publisher's comments on it) gives an interesting view of the circumstances. Steenstra notes that he is a leading mathematician but prefers to publish his work anonymously, and the first three parts of the Aanmerkingen identify him only as a "Liefhebber der Waterloopkunde" (a devotee of hydrodynamics). The last leaf of the first part is an advertisement for Slob's work, first issued by the same publishers eight years earlier. It is here bound before Steenstra's rebuttal, which explicitly describes itself as a (third) supplement to the Aanmerkingen. The final work is not explicitly presented as a supplement to the Aanmerkingen, but matches its format and layout and is often found bound with it. Bierens de Haan lists both maps (showing the IJ from Amsterdam to the west) under the second supplement; here one is bound at the end of the first and the other at the end of the second. The making of these rather schematic maps is also discussed in the publisher's notes to Steenstra's letter in part 1.
In fine condition, with only an occasional spot. Binding worn at the edges and with a crack in one hinge, but still very good. An interesting discussion of two key problems of Dutch civil hydraulic engineering.
