FAULHABER, Johann.
Geheime Kunstkammer: darin[n]en hundert allerhand Kriegs Stratagemata, auch andere unerhörte Secreta, und Machinae mirabiles zusehen, dergleichen in Europa (respectivè) wening zu finden.
Ulm, Jonam Saur, 1628. 4to. Half vellum (ca. 1900). 28 pp.
€ 12,500
Very rare first and only edition of a catalogue of military and other instruments, models of machines, plans, etc., that Faulhaber displayed in the "Kunstkammer" in his house in Ulm.
Johann Faulhaber (1580-1635), taught mathematics at Ulm, where his family moved around 1461, after serving as vassals of the Abbot of Fulda. He became the most important of the "Cossists", mathematicians concerned with algebra. After publishing his first arithmetic text, Faulhaber founded his own school in Ulm in 1600, which grew into an internationally famous educational institute for higher mathematical sciences. He later added an artillery and engineering school. Descartes came to study with him, and Faulhaber had a lively contact with Kepler.
Applying mathematics to military engineering, the building of fortifications and the art of fire-arms, Faulhaber was also much in demand as fortification engineer, receiving commissions from the King of Sweden and many others. He published a large number of mathematical works, mostly in German, and invented a number of instruments and machines.
Two different readers have checked off items in the catalogue, perhaps indicating those in their own collections. In very good condition. Bircher A 4515; VD 17, 23:000295W (3 copies); not in Balsiger; Berlin Kat.; Jammes, Cabinets de curiosités; Murray; Sloos, Warfare and the age of printing; for Faulhaber: DSB IV, pp. 549-552.
Related Subjects: