Psellos (Michael) Opus dilucidum in quattuor Mathematicas disciplinas, Arithmeticam, Musicam, Geometriam, & Astronomiam, collation: A-?⁸, ?⁴. 76ff., Greek text, woodcut printer's device on fol. K4v, woodcut animated and decorated initials, woodcut diagrams and geometrical shapes in margins of section devoted to arithmetics and geometry, light water-stain to upper blank margin of final leaves, title uniformly browned and somewhat spotted, 17th-century French calf, covers with gilt fillet and narrow frieze border, corners rubbed, extremities worn, cloth drop-back box, 8vo, 127 x 80mm., Paris, Jacques Bogard, 1545.

⁂ The rare second edition of this compendium of school texts on arithmetics, music, geometry, and astronomy, traditionally ascribed to the 11th-century Byzantine polymath and politician Konstantinos Psellos (better known under his monastic name Michael), following the first edition, which appeared in Venice in 1532. The work was highly praised in the Renaissance. The section devoted to music was strongly influenced by Phythagoras' theories. The book was issued by the renowned Parisian printer Jacques Bogard, who specialised in the production of editions of Greek and Latin classics. The text faithfully follows the Venetian editio princeps by the Cretan Arsenios Aristoboulos Apostolios (1465-1535) and also reproduces the original dedicatory epistle addressed by Francesco Contarini to the cardinal Niccolò Ridolfi.

Literature: Adams P, 2203; STC French, 367; Ph. Renoaurd, Imprimeurs & libraires parisiens du xvi^e siècle, v, Bocart-Bonamy, no. 217.