first edition Contemporary limp vellum, modern paper spine label, later front endpapers
1534 · [Venice:
by Sfortunati, Giovanni
[Venice: Nicolo di Aristotile detto Zoppino,], 1534 First edition of this treatise on arithmetic for merchants. Sfortunati, whose dates are not recorded, was a Siena-born teacher of arithmetic who worked through much of Italy and Sicily. His book, which went into at least six more editions by the year 1568, was influential, being one of the main sources for Tartaglia's General trattato de' numeri et misure, which has been called the best treatise on arithmetic to appear in the sixteenth century. Contemporary limp vellum, modern paper spine label, later front endpapers. Quarto. Title within a woodcut border, divided into four panels. Title printed in black and red. Text with many mathematical calculations printed in the outer margins. Title a bit soiled, lower margins of first three leaves with repaired worming, lower outer corner of some leaves with an old, faded dampstain. a few light brown stains. Still, a very good copy of a rare book. Riccardi emphasizes the rarity of the first edition: "Questa prima ediz. e rarissima" (II, 453). The last copies of the first edition to appear at auction came up in the 1980s. OCLC notes nine copies of this edition in North America (the Huntington Library, the Burndy Library (at the Huntington), Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Columbia, the Smithsonian, the U.S. Naval Observatory, Mount Angel Abbey Library in Oregon, Lehigh University).
(Inventory #: 16590)