3 minute read
Two Recent Gifts from the University of Scranton Jesuit Center
Gasparis Schotti, S. J., Schola Steganographica In Classes Octo Distributa, Quibus, praeter alia multa, ac jucundissima, explicantur Artificia Nova … Nürnberg, Sumptibus Johannis Andreae Endteri & Wolfgangi Junioris, 1665. This first edition is quartobound in contemporary vellum, containing eight engraved plates, with three partly engraved folding tables, and five engravings in text.
Gaspar Schott, S.J. (1608-1666), spent much of his career at Augsburg engaged in the teaching of science and writing. This treatise on cryptography is largely a compilation of cipher systems inspired by or derived from Schott’s teacher and mentor, Athanasius Kircher, S.J., who had published his own Polygraphia on the subject two years earlier. The work discusses different encrypting and deciphering systems, and the mechanical instruments involved. The book also deals with the transmission of secret magnetic signals with the help of compasses, secret alphabets, codes in musical notation, sign languages for communications with the deaf and mute, coding machines, and earlier forms of secret writing.
Philippo Buonanni, S. J. Micrographia Curiosa sive Rerum Minutissimarum Observationes, quae ope Microscopii … Romæ, typis Antonii de Rubeis, 1703. A small quarto with a frontispiece, 38 plates (some folded) including two diagrams. First and only separate edition. Bound in contemporary vellum with manuscript title at spine. Engraved frontispiece is by Hubert after G.B. Leonardis.
Philippo Buonanni, S. J. (1638-1725), was likely the first to employ a microscope in the practice of medicine. In the Micrographia Curiosa, he discusses the designs and quality of early microscopes and a detailed description of Buonanni’s microscopes, illustrated on two plates. Buonanni, a very well-educated Jesuit, was a pupil of Athanasius Kircher, S.J., and succeeded his master as a teacher of math ematics at the Collegium Romanum. The rest of the 38 plates shows objects seen through the microscope, including several illustrations of insects. Buonanni was also the librarian of the Roman College and archivist of the collection of antiquities bequeathed to this establishment by Athanasius Kircher. He invented one of the first screw-barrel horizontal microscopes.
—Professor Michael Knies, Special Collections Librarian and University Archivist
