{"product_id":"georg-agricola-s-de-re-metallica-libri-xii","title":"Georg Agricola’s De re metallica libri XII","description":"\u003ch3\u003eThe Foundational Work of Modern Mining Science with Nearly 300 Woodcuts in a Spectacular Mansfeld-Style Mosaic Binding by Louis Hagué\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAgricola, Georg. \u003cem\u003eDe re metallica libri XII. Quibus officia, instrumenta, machinae, ac omnia denique ad Metallicam spectantia, non modò luculentissimè describuntur sed \u0026amp; per effigies…\u003c\/em\u003e Basel, Hieronymus Froben and Nikolaus Episcopius, 1561.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne of the great scientific books of the Renaissance and the foundational work of modern mining science: Georg Agricola’s monumental \u003cem\u003eDe re metallica\u003c\/em\u003e, here in the second Latin edition of 1561, magnificently illustrated with nearly 300 woodcuts depicting every aspect of sixteenth-century mining, metallurgy, geology, machinery, smelting, surveying, and mineral extraction.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe work survives in an extraordinary nineteenth-century mosaic pastiche binding by the celebrated binder and forger Louis Hagué, executed in an elaborate neo-Grolier style with the arms of the Counts of Mansfeld and long associated with one of the great binding controversies of the nineteenth century.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eEdition \u0026amp; Bibliographic Information\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eΑ6 a-z6 A-Z6 Aa-Bb6 = 6 leaves, 502 pages, 36 leaves of index, 1 leaf. Final blank Α1 present. Index printed in double columns. Entirely ruled throughout.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIllustrated with two engraved plates, including one folding plate with seven figures, together with 290 woodcut illustrations, many full-page and 25 geometric or schematic diagrams, printer’s devices on first and final pages, and fifteen historiated initials, all in woodcut. Folio (316 × 203 mm).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNineteenth-century mosaic pastiche binding in the Grolier style by Louis Hagué of brown calf over smooth spine, richly decorated with black interlaced strapwork framed in gilt on a gilt-dotted ground, central gilt arms of the Counts of Mansfeld on both covers, gilt board edges, and elaborately gauffered and painted gilt edges. Preserved in a modern brown half morocco case lined in velour.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThough conceived as a historical imitation, the binding itself has become an important object in the history of collecting, forgery, and nineteenth-century bibliophilic taste.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eThe Book that Created Modern Mining Science\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe importance of \u003cem\u003eDe re metallica\u003c\/em\u003e can scarcely be overstated.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWith this monumental work Georg Agricola (1494–1555) became what later scholars would call the founder of modern mining science. For nearly two centuries the book remained the standard technical authority on mining and metallurgy throughout Europe. No earlier work approached its scale, systematic organization, practical precision, or visual sophistication.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAgricola embodied the Renaissance ideal of the \u003cem\u003euomo universale\u003c\/em\u003e. Physician, natural scientist, engineer, economist, diplomat, historian, and politician, he served repeatedly as mayor of Chemnitz while simultaneously conducting extensive research throughout the mining regions of Saxony and Bohemia.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBeginning work on the project around 1530, Agricola sought nothing less than to organize the entirety of mining knowledge into a coherent scientific system.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe twelve books proceed methodically from the justification of mining itself through geology, surveying, mine construction, machinery, ore processing, smelting, assaying, metallurgy, salt extraction, sulfur, bitumen, and glass production.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eThe Renaissance Invention of Technical Illustration\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eParticularly revolutionary was Agricola’s use of visual representation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMining knowledge had previously existed largely as practical oral tradition transmitted from one generation of miners to the next. Agricola transformed this experiential knowledge into a systematic visual and typographic language capable of being studied independently from direct apprenticeship.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe nearly 300 woodcuts therefore do far more than merely “illustrate” the text.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThey form an essential component of Agricola’s scientific method itself. Complex mining operations are broken down into sequential visual stages: shafts, pumping systems, hoists, furnaces, drainage mechanisms, smelting ovens, crushing mills, transportation systems, and underground galleries appear in analytical isolation before being recombined conceptually by the reader.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSome of the most striking images present breathtaking sectional views deep into the mines themselves, creating entirely new ways of visualizing subterranean space. One famous illustration on page 276 contains what is believed to be the first depiction of a rail system using wooden tracks.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSeveral of the larger compositions bear the monogram of Hans Rudolf Manuel Deutsch, who translated the final designs into woodcut, while some drawings may derive from Basilius Wehring of Joachimsthal. Agricola himself reportedly supervised and commissioned artists directly in order to achieve maximum technical clarity.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eScience and Superstition Underground\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYet the work also preserves a fascinating tension between Renaissance empiricism and older subterranean mythology.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIncluded at the end is Agricola’s \u003cem\u003eDe animantibus subterraneis\u003c\/em\u003e, a treatise on underground creatures first issued separately in 1549. Alongside rigorous technical observation appear accounts of mining spirits, kobolds, dragons, and subterranean demons inhabiting the depths of the earth.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe juxtaposition reveals how incompletely the Renaissance had separated scientific investigation from inherited folklore and cosmological imagination.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eThe Mansfeld Binding and the Louis Hagué Controversy\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe binding is itself a remarkable bibliophilic object.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt first glance the volume appears to preserve an authentic sixteenth-century Mansfeld binding of the type associated with the great collector and statesman Peter Ernst, Count of Mansfeld (1517–1604). The black interlaced strapwork on gilt-dotted grounds closely imitates genuine Mansfeld bindings in the Grolier style.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn reality, however, the binding was created around 1875–1880 by the Paris- and Brussels-based binder Louis Hagué, among the most skilled and notorious creators of historical pastiche bindings in the nineteenth century. Hagué combined decorative elements associated with both Peter Ernst and his son Karl von Mansfeld, inadvertently revealing the binding’s modern origin.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe volume later entered the collection of the English bibliophile John Blacker through the dealer Bernard Quaritch, who appears to have accepted the binding as genuine. Only after Blacker’s death were the bindings recognized as sophisticated historical imitations and dispersed at Sotheby’s in 1897 as “modern imitations.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eToday these Hagué bindings are admired not merely as forgeries, but as extraordinary works of nineteenth-century craftsmanship in their own right.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eProvenance\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFrom Louis Hagué through Bernard Quaritch to the English collector John Blacker; sold Sotheby’s, Wilkinson \u0026amp; Hodge, London, 11 November 1897, lot 4.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLiterature\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAdams A 349; \u003cem\u003eBibliotheca Osleriana\u003c\/em\u003e 670 (first edition 1556); BM STC German 8; Brunet I, 113; Dibner 88 (first edition); Ferguson I, 9f.; Graesse I, 43; Horblit 2b (first edition); PMM 79 (first edition); VD16 A 934; Wellcome I, 68; Wilsdorf, \u003cem\u003eopus\u003c\/em\u003e 24. For the Hagué binding: Dubois d’Enghien 173; Hamanová 70; van der Vekene, \u003cem\u003eLe bibliophile\u003c\/em\u003e 25f. (this copy); van der Vekene, \u003cem\u003eLes reliures\u003c\/em\u003e 108 and plate XVII.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor a fuller scholarly description and illustrations, see \u003cem\u003eWunderkammer\u003c\/em\u003e Catalogue 90, number 56:\u003cbr\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/issuu.com\/heribert-tenschert\/docs\/katalog_90_vol_2_web?utm_source=chatgpt.com\"\u003eWunderkammer Catalogue 90, Volume II\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Atelier Zweig Rare Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46842396639420,"sku":null,"price":0.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0736\/1285\/3436\/files\/Agricola-1.png?v=1779235496","url":"https:\/\/atelierzweig.com\/products\/georg-agricola-s-de-re-metallica-libri-xii","provider":"Atelier Zweig Rare Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}