Science. BARATTIERI. Architettura d'acque.

BARATTIERI, Gio. Battista. Architettura d'Acque divisa in Otto Libri. Piacenza, Gio. Bazachi, 1656

Bound with: Architettura d'Acque nella quale si contiene: Misura, Divisione, e Livellatione dell'Acque correnti, con molte Scritture di vari casi. Piacenza, Gio. Bazachi, 1663

2 parts in a volume. In small folio, mm. 290x200; contemporary quarter calf binding, gilt title and ornaments on spine, corners, red edges; pp. (20), 277, (3), 40 woodcut illustrations, which 2 of them on double page depicting both the Po river to the Lambro at the Adda river on the pages 234-35 e 240-41, a woodcut plate on double page out text (plate n. IX); pp. (8), 296, a lot of woodcut illustrations in the text and a folded plate out text on the pages 258 and 259 depicting leveling tools. Restored back on binding. Some slight yellowing and some pages with wormholes and loss of text. Unsophisticated copy in wide margins.

Very rare first illustrated edition. Complete work of the two parts released in different years. Monumental work of hydraulics, particularly concerning rivers, of which the author deals with all aspects, from the source to the speed of the current, from the transformation of the bed to the floods, from corrosion to the techniques for the construction of the embankments. Riccardi: "Questa opera del Barattieri è una delle più apprezzate nella idraulica pratica... le due parti riunite di questa edizione sono difficili a rinvenirsi." G.B. Barattieri, a skilful Lodiian engineer, in the present work he used, as well as his long experience in hydraulic engineering in Lombardy and in the Veneto region, the writings of B. Castelli, of which ample pieces are reproduced in the second part. Singer: "The best exemple in our period of a practical scientific work on the problems of river regulation". Riccardi I, 73; Zeitlinger, 3d Supplement, n. 3789; Singer III, 315; Vinciana, n. 1631, the second edition.