Beschreibung
First edition of Galilei's treatise on his experiments with sound, a major influence on his son. It includes the first examples of musical engraving in a book and is the earliest work to print ancient Greek music. "The origins of the experimental aspect of modern science are to be sought in sixteenth-century music" (Drake, p. 483). A skilled lutenist and mathematician, Galilei (1520-1591) rejected the Pythagorean system of numerical tonal intervals in favour of observable investigation. He "was outspokenly against the acceptance of authority in matters that can be investigated directly. He did not accept the idea that some musical intervals were natural. Any sound was as natural as any other. Whether it pleased the ear was quite another matter, and the way to determine this was to use the ear, not the number system" (Drake, pp. 495-6). The publication of this work caused controversy within Galilei's intellectual circle, the Florentine Camerata, and publicly contradicted the classical opinions of his former teacher, Gioseffo Zarlino (1517-1590), who argued that the Ptolemaic diatonic scale was the only tuning appropriate for song. Zarlino sought to suppress Dialogo della musica antica and published a refutation in 1588. Galilei responded in his 1589 book, Discorso intorno alle opere di Gioseffo Zarlino. To demonstrate his research, Galilei includes four hymns by Mesomedes of Crete, a lyric poet active during the second century CE. These "were the only specimens of ancient music known until 1841" (West, p. 7). Galilei's emphasis on ancient Greek melody and rejection of polyphony eventually led to the development of Baroque operas and arias. Adams G139; Bibliothèque A. Cortot, p. 83; Cinti 6; Eitner IV 128; Fetis III, p. 384; Gaspari I, p. 219; Gregory, p. 103; RISM B.IV, p. 344. Stillman Drake, "Renaissance Music and Experimental Science", Journal of the History of Ideas, vol. 31, no. 4, Oct. 1970; M. L. West, Ancient Greek Music, 1992. Folio (328 x 215 mm) in sixes, pp. [iv], 149, [11]. With 2 examples of engraved musical illustrations in text (pp. 71 and 78), woodcut folding chart tipped onto p. 120 as issued, title within elaborate border, diagrams and illustrations (several full-page), historiated initials, head- and tailpieces, printer's device at colophon. Contemporary limp vellum, traces of ties, yapp edges. Housed in a brown quarter morocco solander box and chemise by the Chelsea Bindery. Contemporary manuscript additions to musical scores, consistent with other copies; 17th-century partially erased ownership inscription and shelfmark on front free endpaper, marginalia in same hand to pp. 101, 128, 144, and 148 (likely by music scholar: p. 148 note references Giovanni Battista Doni's 1635 Compendio del trattato de' generi et de' modi della musica). Extremities a little worn, spine browned, two short splits over cords, contents sporadically damp-stained, namely at lower outer corners, minor insect damage along gutters of endpapers, short closed tear to centre of title page resulting in tiny spot of loss, later deletion in ink to two lines on p. 70: a well-preserved copy pleasingly in a contemporary binding. Bestandsnummer des Verkäufers 169704
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