Averroeana: Being a transcript of several letters from Averroës an Arabian philosopher at Corduba in Spain, to Metrodorus a young Grecian nobleman, student at Athens, in the years 1149, and 1150. Also: Several letters from Pythagoras to the King of India, together with his reception at the Indian court, and an account of his discourse with the King, and his gymnosophists, and his rules and precepts: his account of the power and efficacy of numbers, and magical uses thereof. To which is prefixt, a Latin letter by Monsieur Grinau . . . concerning the subject of these papers and how they came to his hands. The whole containing matters highly philosophical, physiological, pythagorical, and medicinal. The work having been long conceal'd . . .

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First edition, small 8vo (approx. 95 x 145 mm): pp. [22], 162. Latin dedicatory letter by Grinau is given in an English version also. Early 20th-century speckled calf with blind-tooled border, spine with gilt floral motif in panels and green morocco label; new endpapers; bound very close to back edge, affecting text on title page. Pages browned and spotted throughout (as usual) with occasional small ink stains; top edge cropped close with some running headlines and page numbers shaved. Corners of textblock slightly bumped. A rare curiosity. Averroës (Ibn Rushd, 1126--1198), an Andalusian Arab philosopher and physician, was perhaps the greatest of the rationalist philosophers of the medieval Arab tradition. He wrote important commentaries on Aristotle as well as a major treatise on medicine, and his work led to the emergence of secular thought in western Europe. The averroean letters in the present work are a curious mix of the physiological, medical, and philosophical, while the pythagorean letters deal with such diverse topics as vegetarianism and the mystical power of numbers. These letters purport to have been discovered at Andalusia in the 17th century by a Monsieur Grinau, but are spurious. The Macclesfield copy, Lot 3873 in Sotheby's sale of 2008, sold for £1875. N° de ref. del artículo ABE-11

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