GIUSEPPE PIAZZI (1746 - 1826)

Praecipuarum stellarum inerrantium positiones mediae ineunte seculo XIX. ex observationibus habitis in specula Panormitana ab anno 1792 ad annum 1802. Panormi, typis Regiis, 1803.


§ Folio, XL, [706], 76 pp; Most of the text composed of astronomical tables; chalcographic vignettes on the title page and leaf b1r. Original half-leather binding (brown paper on convers) with gild-stamped title on the spine; a charming, excellently preserved copy.
First, rare and sought-after edition of one of the most important star catalogues of all time, by the Theatine father Giuseppe Piazzi, among the greatest astronomer of the early 19th century.
Piazzi taught mathematics in a number of Italian cities; in 1780 he was summoned by the viceroy of Sicily, to fill the chair of higher mathematics at the Royal Academy of Palermo. With the aim to establish an astronomical observatory in the Sicilian city, toward the end of the 1780s Piazzi went to England - where he made acquaintance of Nevil Maskelyne (1732 - 1811), William Herschel (1738 - 1822) and Jesse Ramsden (1735 - 1800) - in order to obtain the best possible equipment.
Having returned to Palermo, where the observatory was inaugurated on 1790, Piazzi took up the problem of the precise determination of the astronomical coordinates (direct ascension and declination) of the principal stars. Between 1792 and 1802 Piazzi dedicated himself in the intense and fatiguing work of star cataloguing, ultimately publishing the present repertoire, indicating the medial positions of 6.748 stars. This catalogue was more accurate than any of its predecessors and the Institut de France awarded it the Lalande Prize for the best astronomical work published in 1803.
Among Piazzi’s major accomplishments it is also worth remembering the discovery of Ceres in 1801, the largest object in the asteroid belt that lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter (called by the astronomer Cerere Ferdinandea). With a diameter of 945 km, Ceres is both the largest of the asteroids and the only unambiguous dwarf planet inside Neptune’s orbit.
Ref: OCLC 490273223