Ma’aseh Tuviah
AUCTION 49 |
Wednesday, October 27th,
2010 at 1:00
Fine Judaica: Hebrew Printed Books, Manuscripts, Autograph Letters and Graphic Art
Lot 88
COHN, TOBIAS.
Ma’aseh Tuviah
Venice: 1707
Est: $2,500 - $3,500
PRICE REALIZED $2,600
Celebrated encyclopedia of natural sciences, with a lexicon of pharmacological and botanical terms in Hebrew, Latin and Turkish and most significantly, an important section on medicine (including anatomy and gynecology). Includes discussions on the medical properties of tobacco, description of the "plica polonica" and an examination of the Magdeburg experiment on the vacuum. Also discusses the future Redemption and the theological and social consequences of the Sabbatian debacle (see ff. 24-29).
The Author, Tobias Cohn (1652-1729) was born in Metz and raised by relatives in Cracow following his father's untimely death. He studied medicine in Italy at the University of Padua and went on to serve as a Court physician in Turkey. Ma'aseh Tuviah was written in Adrianople (today Edirne). See EJ, Vol. V, cols. 692-693; JE, Vol. IV, pp. 161-162 (incl. facs. of anatomical plate from Ma'aseh Tuviah, f.106r.)