INSTRUMENT FOR SURVEYING AND GUNNERY

ZUBLER, LEONHARD.

Novum Instrumentum Geometricum: Das ist, Kurtzer und grundtlicher Bericht alle Weite, Breite, Höhe und Tieffe, mit sonderbarem Vortheil, kunstlichen und gewiss, auch von der Arithmetic unerfahrnen abzumessen: Mit XXII. schönen, kunstreichen und verständlichen Kuppferstucken geziert und erklärt: Auch den Kunstliebenden zugefallen, an jetzo erstlich an tag geben: Durch Leonhard Zubler, Burger zu Zürich.

Basel, Ludwig Königs, 1607.

4to. Sewn as issued in later blank wrappers. Engraved ornamental title showing 2 geometers with instruments, on verso large engraved coat of arms (Henry Prince of Wales). (8),65,(2) pp. With 20 large engravings in the text. Printed on good paper, fine and clean.

First edition, though a Latin translation appeared at the same time.

Zubler was a prolific mathematician and instrument-maker in Zürich, and in this work he describes a triangulation instrument (depicted on a full-page engraving), invented by himself, and shows its use in different situations of practical surveying and military use in artistic settings. The triangulation instrument was able to provide measures for length, width, height and angles all at once, to be read on the scales on the baseline etc.

The instrument has two arms and a baseline. By fixing the angle between the baseline and the pivoted arm, setting the sliding sight on the baseline arm to the scaled length of the baseline itself, and finally, from the second station, sighting across the two arms while moving the second sliding sight into alignment with the first sight and the target, the side of the triangle on the ground will be given with the position of the second sight, adjusted to the scale. The provision of a degree scale on a semicircular plate at the pivot permits other techniques involving angle measurements or setting the arms at right angles.

Cockle: 947 (Latin ed.) - Poggendorff II:1420.

Order-nr.: 35352