Subject: Re: [HM] Anthrakitis' Book (was: Heron's formula)
From: Lambrou Michael (lambrou@itia.math.uch.gr)
Date: Mon Mar 06 2000 - 17:39:48 EST
After Gennadius Library in Athens acquired volume 3 of Hodos Mathematikes
(the Road to Mathematics) by Methodios Anthrakitis (edited by Balanos
Vassilopoulos) published in Venice in 1749, Antreas was kind enough to
send us the following message (which also corrected a small error of
Gennadius' press release)
On Sun, 5 Mar 2000, Antreas P. Hatzipolakis wrote:
>
> Three other Greek libraries are recorded to have one copy each of
> the complete set.....
> .... there are copies of the book in the following three monasteries
> in Mt. Athos (Holy Mountain):
> Vatopediou Monastery, Iviron Monastery, Megistis Lavras Monastery.
> (Th. I. Papadopoulos: Greek Bibliography (1466 ci. - 1800). Vol. I.
> Athens 1984, p. 204, #2739)
>
> Note that some historians (Vretos, Sathas) mention one more edition
> of the book in Venice, 1775, but no copy is known.
> (Papadopoulos, op. cit. #2740)
>
> .... The British Museum also has a copy of Volume 1.
>
In my searches I have found some more. All three volumes can be found at
a)the public library of Milies (a small picturesque tourist village
to-day, but a center of learning in the 18th century), cat. number 510 BA
292
b)the Public Library of Kozani (my source is the catalogue of Delialis),
six copies of each volume, cat. number 576
c) the University of Thessaloniki Library (volume 1 once, and each
of volumes 2 and 3, twice), cat. number 92528
d) the Library of the Patmos Library (for those who don't know, this
is where saint John wrote the Apocalypse), volume 1 three times, volumes 2
and 3 twice each (my source is the catalogue of E. Fragiskos and father
Chrisostomos Florentis).
It is perhaps worth adding that a)The National Library in Athens has two
copies of volume 1 (cat. numb. 70 and 70a), b) the Monastery of
Olympiotissa (according to the catalogue of Lazarou) has two copies of
volume 1 and one of volume 2, c) the public library of Zagora (also a
small picturesque tourist village to-day, but a center of learning in the
18th century) has a copy of volume 3 and d) The National Library of
Bulgaria in Sofia has some or all the volumes (I don't have any more
accurate information on this).
There are also three hand written manuscripts, each of the major part of
volume 3. They are all dated 1732 (that is, 17 years prior to the
printing of this magnificent book). One is at the Greek Institute in
Venice, Italy, and the other two at the National Library in Athens.
Antreas also quotes that the historians Vretos and Sathas (see few line
above) mention a second edition of 1775, no copy of which is known.
True, I have never seen a copy of this. Could it be that it does not
exist? Could it be that the two historians are wrong? It is worth
searching. Here are a few observations.
De-Kigalas on his list of books (Ermoupolis 1846) is the first, as far as
I know, who mentions the 1775 printing. This is repeatd by Vretos in 1857,
Sathas in 1868 and in modern times by Ladas & Hatzidimos, and others,
in their respective catalogues. But the historian Zaviras in 1872 does not
mention it: As a matter of fact the history of Zaviras, although printed
four years after Sathas', was written several years before the later's. In
fact the later is often a word for word copy from Zaviras' history, which
was then circulating manuscript form (I have noticed this by
comparing...) so he must have had a different source. It seems
that De-Kigalas started the error (if indeed it is an error). One may need
to go to a different path to answer the question of the existence or not
of a 1775 edition of Hodos Mathematikes. For instance by looking at
catalogues of books printed in Venice. Here we need to look at Antonio
Vortoli's prints.
That is all for now.
Michael Lambrou
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