May 15, 2012 - Sale 2279

Sale 2279 - Lot 245

Price Realized: $ 1,020
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 300 - $ 500
SOMERVILLE, MARY. Mechanism of the Heavens. lxx, 623 pages. 8vo, contemporary calf, spine badly worn, missing top compartment, joints and spine ends reinforced with electrical tape, front cover and opening leaves loose; contents clean apart from early owner's extensive pencil annotations on endpapers. London: John Murray, 1831
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first edition of Somerville's first book, an English version of Laplace's 1798-1827 Mécanique Céleste, limited to 750 copies. "Mary Somerville was the first woman scientist to win an international reputation entirely in her own right rather than by working in association with a father, husband, or brother. Self-educated in mathematics and astronomy, she wrote many textbooks dealing with celestial mechanics, geography, and the sciences in general"--BEA, page 1072. DSB XII, 521-25.