Geometry and Astronomy in New College, Oxford

Geometry and Astronomy in New College, Oxford
On the Quatercentenary of the Savilian Professorships 1619–2019

This book tells the dual history of astronomy and geometry from the late fourteenth century to the present day in New College, Oxford, and also of the professors over the past four hundred years who have led research and teaching in these mathematical disciplines within both the University and the College.

Edited by William Poole and Christopher Skelton-Foord  |  Designed by Colin Dunn

Oxford: New College Library & Archives, 2019
New College Library & Archives Publications no. 1

Illustrations, largely colour  |  235 x 170 mm  |  96 pages
ISBN 978-1-9160651-0-9

Price (including postage & packing): £11 (UK)  |  £14 (rest of Europe)  |  £17 (elsewhere)  |
£5  (New College students collect from College)

To order your copy, please download an order form.

This video shows New College Library’s copy of Astronomicum Cæsareum (Ingolstadt, 1540) in action.  Our spectacular sixteenth-century book contains volvelles, an ingenious technical feat.  These devices consist of moveable circles which serve to ascertain the rising and setting of the sun and moon, and the movements of the constellations, and to forecast eclipses and comets.  They originally had seed pearls threaded onto them to aid the reader, but these were so miniscule that most copies have lost theirs.  Unusually, the New College Library copy still has almost all of its pearls.

Astronomicum Cæsareum (Ingolstadt, 1540), New College Library, Oxford, BT1.70.2 from New College, Oxford on Vimeo.

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