De Re Metallica

Item Details

London, For the Translators by The Mining Magazine, 1912, Hardcover, Vellum

First English Language, Very Good

First English Edition. Tall quarto in vellum with title in black to the spine. [xxxi] 637pp. With reproductions of the original woodcuts. Numbered 2794. The title continues; with Biographical Introduction, Annotation and Appendices upon the Development of Mining Methods, Metallurgical Processes, Geology, Mineralogy and Mining Law from the earliest times to the 16th Century.

De re Metallica (Latin for On the Nature of Metals) is a book in Latin cataloguing the state of the art of mining, refining, and smelting metals, published in 1556. The author was Georg Bauer, whose pen name was the Latinized Georgius Agricola. The book remained the authoritative text on mining for 180 years after its publication. It was also an important chemistry text for the period and is significant in the history of chemistry. The 292 superb woodcut illustrations and the detailed descriptions of machinery made it a practical reference for those wishing to replicate the latest in mining technology.

In 1912, the first English translation of De Re Metallica was privately published in London by subscription. The translators were married couple Herbert Hoover, a mining engineer (and later President of the United States), and Lou Henry Hoover, a geologist and Latinist. The translation is notable not only for its clarity of language, but for the extensive footnotes, which detail the classical references to mining and metals. 

A couple of very small marks to the cover otherwise clean and unmarked throughout.