This is the first copy of Icones instrumentorum to be offered for sale in the open market for more than 80 years.

Shortly after the publication of the Epistolarum astronomicarum, Brahe issued, perhaps as an addendum, the Icones instrumentorum. It contains 18 woodcuts of the instruments used on Hven: “Probably right after the end of this volume, Tycho Brahe had a small book made in his printing press, which could almost be described as a kind of addition to the collection of letters. His woodcarvers had already been working a long time on producing a complete collection of depictions of his instruments. As mentioned above Tycho Brahe had also published several of the finished images, partly as individual prints which had been sent to his friends, partly as illustrations in his books. His plan was to publish a larger work with pictures of the buildings on the island of Hveen and all the instruments, accompanied by detailed descriptions. As he had not yet reached the point where this plan could be brought to fruition, and since a description of his observations and instruments, of which only the first were reproduced in pictures, had been included in the astronomical collection of letters, he compiled a supplement with 18 pictures of instruments in a small quarter page booklet, which he provided with the title page.”

Icones instrumentorum is only known in 3 copies in public national libraries in Breslau/Wroclaw, Stockholm and Vienna. Lauritz Nielsen states: “[…] Only four copies are known, three of which were recorded by L. Nielsen. None of these copies are in Copenhagen. The fourth copy [THIS] turned up in Germany around 1930. It was sold by a Danish antiquarian bookseller to Dr. A. Lindskoug in Malmö for DKK 2000. It was bound together with Tycho Brahe’s Epistolarum Astronimocarum […] and at Lindskoug’s sale in 1937 it was sold to a private collector for DKK 3600.”

Icones instrumentorum is bound with the very important work Epistolarum astronomicarum (1596) on which Rosenkilde and Ballhausen states: "Friends of Brahe, in particular Henrik Rantzau, urged Brahe to publish his correspondence, and the printing of this is known to have started well ahead of 1590. However, as with all major works from the printing-office on Hven, it took many years before the book was finished. The contents are in the main the letters exchanged with Landgraf Wilhelm of Hessen and his court-astronomer, Christoffer Rothmann. Included in the book is a description written in German on the buildings and instruments found on Hven. Three woodcuts: Uranienborg, Stjerneborg and the island of Hven are likewise incorporated.”

Brahe (1546–1601) had been interested in the celestial spheres since he was a child and had a strong suspicion that the prevailing methods of astronomy were inaccurate. He was, of course, right, but it was difficult to disregard the methods and philosophy of the learned men of the Antiquity and the Middle Ages, from Aristotle to Regiomontanus, who thought the celestial spheres to be invariable. But with his observation of the new star suddenly appearing in the constellation of Cassiopeia on 11 November 1572 and the publication of his observations, he proved that the celestial spheres were in fact variable, contrary to common beliefs. Tycho’s discovery of the new star and his publication of his observations of it in “De nova stella” in 1573 marked his transformation from a Danish dilettante to an astronomer with a European reputation. What Tycho Brahe accomplished, using only his simple instruments and practical talents, remains an outstanding accomplishment of the Renaissance.

Lauritz Nielsen: Dansk Bibliografi 1551–1600, Cph 1931, #975; Rosenkilde and Balhausen: Thesaurus Librorum Danicorum, Cph 1987, #256 and #257; Lauritz Nielsen: Tycho Brahes Bogtrykkeri. Cph 1946.

Provenance: A private Danish collection.