Beschreibung:

PERKINS, Peter (d. 1680). The Seaman’s Tutor: Explaining Geometry, Cosmography, and Trigonometry. London: Obadiah Blagrave, 1682. Very rare and complete first edition copy of this navigation textbook by an early professor at the Royal Mathematical School. No copy traced in auction records since an incomplete copy sold in 1965. King Charles II, with the support of Jonas Moore, Christopher Wren Samuel Pepys, and Isaac Newton, founded the Royal Mathematical School (RMS) at Christ’s Hospital in 1673 as a specialist mathematics and navigation training program for future officers of the Royal Navy and the merchant marine (Cotter). Perkins was regarded as an experienced and capable teacher of practical mathematics, especially surveying, and his appointment was strongly supported by Jonas Moore himself as well as some of the leading mathematicians and scientists of the day, including John Flamsteed, Edmond Halley and Robert Hooke (Ellerton & Clements). Unfortunately, Perkins died just two years after his appointment and before the final publication of his Seaman’s Tutor . Perkins is credited for having prepared several chapters of Jonas Moore’s work on navigational mathematics, A New Systeme of the Mathematicks (1681). Surviving account books from Christ’s Hospital show no evidence that the RMS ever acquired copies of Moore’s better known work or used it as part of its curriculum, at least not between 1682 and 1695. The school, however, did purchased copies of The Seaman’s Tutor for use by its instructors and students (Ellerton & Clements). ESTC R5526; Wing P1559. See C. H. Cotter, “A brief historical survey of British navigation manuals,” The Journal of Navigation 36.2 (May 1983), pp. 237-249; N.F. Ellerton and M.A. Clements, Samuel Pepys, Isaac Newton, James Hodgson, and the Beginnings of Secondary School Mathematics (Springer, 2017), pp. 68-71. 12mo (131 x 80mm). Engraved frontispiece portrait of Perkins, engraved plate depicting a pupil of the Hospital School, 2 pages of publisher’s advertisements, 1 full-page woodcut diagram, 4 woodcut charts, 1 woodcut compass volvelle, and mathematical tables (approximately 10 leaves shaved touching letters). Early 20th-century half morocco over blue cloth, title in gilt on spine. Provenance: Robert Jeffreys of Acton (probably Robert Jeffreys of Acton Park, near Wrexham, Wales, d. 1714; bookplate dated 1711) – Barons Harlech and the Ormsby Gore family of Glyn Cywarch, Wales (their sale, Bonhams, 29 March 2017, lot 344).