(EARLY AMERICAN IMPRINT) Oliver Andrew Jr An Essay on Comets

Sale 2344 - Lot 132

Unsold

Estimate: $ 600 - $ 900

(EARLY AMERICAN IMPRINT.) Oliver, Andrew, Jr. An Essay on Comets. Folding plate. 8vo, modern 1/4 calf; minor foxing, half-title worn with early paper repair, inked library number on verso of title page; early Maine gift inscription for "this small entertaining tract" on half-title, with 1855 inscription by antiquarian J. Wingate Thornton and inked library stamp. Salem, MA: Samuel Hall, 1772

Set Alert for Similar Items

Additional Details

first edition. In addition to contending that comets might be inhabited and that objects in the solar system were surrounded by atmospheres of air, "Oliver explained the cometary tail phenomenon by supposing that the atmospheres of the Sun, Earth, and comets were similar and mutually repellent" (Yeomans, Comets, page 164). Oliver also dismisses the popular notion that comets served as "penal worlds . . . whose inhabitants are condemned to be frozen and burned alternately, at their aphelia and perihelia" (page ii). Evans 12498; Sabin 57199 ("the earliest American work on the subject").