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ATLAS OF CONSTELLATIONS WITH STARS PERFORATED & COLOURED FOR BACKLIGHTING
BRAUN, Friedrich. Himmels-Atlas in transparenten Karten.
Stuttgart, Wilhelm Nitzschke (on the charts also Brussels, Auguste Schnée), [1860].
INCLUDING: BRAUN, Friedrich. Gemeinfassliche Himmelskunde, zugleich ein Führer bei dem Gebrauch des Himmels-Atlas in transparenten Karten.
Stuttgart, Wilhelm Nitzschke, [1860]. 2 volumes. 4to (portfolio with charts) and 8vo (handbook). Celestial Atlas with a large folding perforated star chart (62 x 51.5 cm) printed in black and blue on heavy white paper (with back-lit stars in 6 colours) and 30 numbered perforated charts of 41 constellations (each 22.5 x 28.5 cm), printed in black on heavy blue paper (with back-lit stars in yellow) with French, English and German titles. Publisher's gold and blind-blocked black cloth portfolio (atlas) and publisher's yellow printed wrappers (handbook).
| Orders and Information | € 2500 |
First and only edition of a rare celestial atlas by Friedrich Braun, with a large star chart showing the entire sky from the north pole to 40 degrees south latitude, and a set of thirty numbered charts showing forty-one individual constellations, each constellation outlined with pinholes. Also included (in its original wrappers) is Braun's separate handbook, intended as a guide to the use of the atlas, but often lacking. All the charts are designed to be viewed backlighted, with each star punched through the thicker upper layer in any of five different shapes and sizes (in order of increasing magnitude: dot, 4-point, 3-point, 5-point and 8-point star). The thinner translucent backing paper is coloured behind each star, yellow in the thirty small charts and red, orange, yellow, green, blue and white in the large folding chart. We do not know whether Braun, who lived in Esslingen, near Stuttgart, was a professional astronomer, but his accessible yet technically detailed Gemeinfassliche Himmelskunde shows his expertise in the field. It also notes that he intended the atlas to serve as an introduction to the complicated field of astronomy. To help users recognize the complex constellations he therefore simplifies them slightly and portrays them in an orderly fashion, but he attempts to retain their authentic forms.
The atlas volume is known in two (probably simultaneous) issues, differing only in the titles. In the present issue, apparently distributed by Schnée in Brussels, the title of the atlas volume (which appears only on the binding) has the same wording as the other, including Nitzschke's Stuttgart imprint, but differs slightly in layout and decoration. The large folding chart has the title in French only ("Carte Transparente du Ciel") with the imprints of both Nitzschke and Schnée, while the other issue has the title in German only ("Transparente Himmels Karte") and the imprint of Nitzschke alone. The numbered charts have their titles in French, German and English, but in the present issue the French appears first in a larger type and in the other issue the German appears first in a larger type. Neither volume is dated, but the handbook, dedicated to Ferdinand von Hochstetter, notes his participation in the famous Novarra scientific expedition around the world in the years 1856 to 1859, and both volumes are dated 1860 in Heinsius's 1863 Allgemeines Bücher-Lexicon (Wendt's Atlas der Naturgeschichte, advertised as "erschien soeben" on the back wrapper of the handbook is dated 1860 in the 1861 Bibliotheca Historico-Naturalis). Schnée was active in Brussels from ca. 1858 to 1864 (while maintaining his original shop in Leipzig).
In very good condition, the handbook with the bolts still unopened. The handbook shows a faint dirt shadow on the front wrapper and minor foxing, mostly along the foot. A lovely atlas, designed for amateurs or students, but with a scientific approach.
