WECKER Johann Jacob – De secretis libri XVII – 1662

Descrizione

WECKER Johann Jacob – De secretis libri XVII. Ex variis authoribus collecti, methodicèque digesti, & aucti per Joan. Jacobum Weckerum, Basiliensem, Medicum Colmariensem. Accessit index locupletissimus – 1662. Basileae, sumptibus Johannis Regis. Excudebat Joh. Rodolphus Genath. Coeval full rigid vellum, with gilt title on a leather label attached on the spine, raised bands; octavo, cm 17 x 9,5 circa; pagg. (2b) 13 (1b) 667 (27) (4b); slight rare foxing and some – physiologically – slightly browned pages, wormholes throughout the whole volume, affecting some letters of the text here and there, a fair copy. Several old ownership notes on the first endpaper and first blank, printer’s device in woodcut on the title page, tables and woodcut illustrations in the text. One of the most well-known books of secrets ever printed, De Secretis shows a wide typographic production, the first edition dated back to 1582 and largely reprinted during the following centuries. The Swiss doctor Wecker sums up here a long list of topics, such as alchemy, demonology, magic, spiritism, astrology, pharmacology among the others, building up a kind of “encyclopaedia of secrets and knowledges”.