VESALIUS Andreas De Humani corporis fabrica libri septem.

Cushing, pp.91-92 ; Durling, 4579 ; Osler, 568 ; Waller, 9901 ;Garrison-Morton, 377: “The better edition of the Fabrica” ; VD-16, V-911 ; voir Dibner, Heralds of Science, 122 ; Heirs of Hippocrates, 281 ; Horblit, 98; PMM, 91 (pour l’édition originale de 1543).

Deuxième édition illustrée, et deuxième édition de ce format.

Elle est précédée par l’édition de 1543 (illustrée) et d’une édition pirate de petit format (non-illustrée).

Comme la première de 1543, elle est illustrée de magnifiques gravures sur bois de Jan Stephan van Calcar, élève du Titien. L’impression de cette seconde édition est plus soignée car tirée sur un papier de meilleure qualité et avec seulement 49 lignes page au lieu de 57 pour celle de 1543, facilitant la lecture. Cette édition de 1555 contient également les dernières corrections par Vésale lui-même (il décéda en 1564).

“The impression of the woodcuts is often clearer and more beautiful than the previous edition; some of the figures have been somewhat improved upon cutting and in the lettering The presswork is more splendid; the fancy initials throughout are larger and more beautiful and are more adorned with drawings different from the those of the first edition. This second edition therefore has, especially for practical purposes, advantages over the first on account of additions in the text and in the illustrations and particularly on account of its more splendid makeup” (Choulant-Franck, 182).

« With De humani corporis fabrica, published when he was only twenty-nine years old, Vesalius revolutionized not only the science of anatomy but how it was taught. Throughout this encyclopaedic work on the structure and workings of the human body, Vesalius provided a fuller and more detailed description of human anatomy than any of his predecessors, correcting errors in the traditional anatomical teachings of Galen… The Fabrica also broke new ground in its unprecedented blending of scientific exposition, art and typography. Although earlier anatomical books, such as those by Berengario da Carpi had contained some notable anatomical illustrations, they had never appeared in such number or been executed in such minute precision as in the Fabrica, and they had usually been introduced rather haphazardly with little or no relationship to the text… The book remains the masterpiece of Johannes Oporinus of Basel, one of the most widely learned and iconoclastic of the so-called ‘scholar-printers’, whose success with this book apparently caused Vesalius to entrust to Oporinus all of his alter publications… Although the illustrations have traditionally been attributed to an associate of Titian, Jan Stephan von Calcar who drew and possibly engraved the three woodcuts of skeletons in Vesalius first series of anatomical charts, Tabulae antomicae sex (1538), there is no reliable basis for this attribution. Modern scholarship attributes the Fabrica woodcuts only to an unknown artist or artists in the school of Titian. Vesalius commissioned the illustrations and supervised their production » (Norman, pour l’édition de 1543).

“It cannot be denied that the Fabrica is the most famous anatomical book ever ^published, to this day one of the most beautiful in existence, and the milestone in all medical history which definitely showed a break from old traditions. It cannot be emphasized too often that this was an epochal book. The beautiful woodcuts, executed under the supervision of Vesalius by the artist Jan Stephan van Calcar (1499-1546?), student of Titian, are famous for their beauty, accuracy, and lavishness of detail and number. It was E. Jackschath of Tilsit who pointed out that the background scenes of the ‘muscle men’ illustrations are, when collected into a continuum, a dioramic replica of the Paduan countryside of the time of Vesalius” (Heirs).

Les feuillets a1 (Titre) et b5 renmargés, dernier feuillet remargé et doublé.

Bon exemplaire, complet et des grandes marges.