Lot 58
Maupertuis, Pierre Louis Moreau de
La figure de la terre
The Library of James Stirling, Mathematician
Auction: 23 October 2025 from 13:00 GMT
Description
déterminée par les observations … faites par ordre du roy au cercle polaire. Paris: Imprimerie royale, 1738. 8vo, contemporary tan calf, xiv [4] 184 pp., engraved folding map, 9 engraved folding plates, extremities slightly rubbed, spine-label perished
Footnote
First edition, presentation copy from the author to James Stirling, inscribed ‘Donum Authoris’ by Stirling on the initial blank. The book was sent to him care of the astronomer John Machin, who informed Stirling of the gift in a surviving letter dated 22nd June 1738 (see lot 66): ‘Monsr Maupertuis has sent you a present of his book which I have deliverd to Mr Watts for you. It contains a complete account of the measurement in the North. Mr Celsius likewise published two or 3 sheets on the same subject chiefly to shew that Cassini’s measurement was far inferior to this in point of exactness, and which I suppose you will need no argument to prove when you have read over M. Maupertuis's book'. Stirling had recently written a paper entitled 'Of the Figure of the Earth, and the Variation of Gravity on the Surface', published in 1735, and considered it 'an important contribution to the theoretical study of the earth's shape and its gravitational forces' (ODNB). He was overtaken in his work on the subject by Colin Maclaurin and others, although it is clear from his surviving letters that he would have made a more substantial contribution had it not been for his commitments as manager of the mines at Leadhills.