Description
Paris: Bachelier, 1846. 1st Edition. Soft cover. Very Good. 1st Edition. Soft cover. 4to - over 9¾ - 12" tall. Recherches sur le mouvements d'Uranus. In: Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences, Vol. XXII, no. 22, June 1846, pp. 907-918. Paris: Bachelier, 1846. Two volumes. 4to (283 x 226 mm). Entire volumes 22 (Jan. - June 1846) and 23 (July - Dec. 1846). [4], 1208; [4], 1219 [1] pp., including half-title and general title-page in each volume. Original plain brown paper wrappers with printed paper label to spines; pages untrimmed and mostly unopened. Some minor foxing in places (first gatherings including half-title and title of vol. 22 stronger), light browning and occasional dust- and finger-soiling mostly to outer margins, half-titles browned stronger; a few leaves frayed. Provenance: from the collection of late Dr. Samy Mizrahi, Bouillargues. A very good, unsophisticated set. ---- Sparrow, Milestones of Science 132; Evans 25; Norman 1343 (book form). - In 1845 the astronomer and physicist Francois Arago encouraged Le Verrier to examine observed anomalies in the movements of the known planet Uranus. Le Verrier began by establishing a precise theory of Uranus which he demonstrated in his memoir "Recherches sur les Mouvements d'Uranus" published in Volume 22, number 22. He showed that the discrepancies in the orbit of Uranus could not be explained by the gravitational effects of the Sun, Jupiter or Saturn, but were in fact caused by the presence of an as yet unknown planet within its orbit. "In 1846, John Couch Adams, an English astronomer, and Urban J. J. Leverrier, a French astronomer, simultaneously and independently determined the location of a possible new planet. Adams put Newton's theory of attraction to a test by studying the causes of the irregularities in the motion of the planet Uranus. In 1845, he wrote of his findings of the mathematical location of the new planet to Sir George Biddell Airy, Astronomer Royal. Because Adams was unknown, his letter was put aside. Meanwhile these same perturbations of Uranus had become of interest to Leverrier. On July 1, 1846, he presented a paper Recherches sur les movement d'Uranus (1846) to the Académie des Sciences in Paris... When Airy realized that Leverrier and Adams had reached the same conclusions, he hastened to suggest that a search be made for the new planet. Shortly thereafter it was seen but not recognized. About a week before it was found in England, it was discovered by Galle in Berlin on information supplied by Leverrier. Thus, the honor of priority of discovery, or even co-discovery of the new Planet, Neptune, was lost to Adams and credited to Leverrier. Adam's paper On the perturbations of Uranus was read before the Royal Astronomical Society, November 13, 1846, and was published in 1847" (Sparrow, p.40). The other papers by Le Verrier and coworkers contained in volume 23 are: 1. Extrait d'une lettre de M. Schumacher à M. Le Verrier, p. 106. 2. Sur la planète qui produit les anomalies observées dans le mouvement d'Uranus - Détermination de sa masse, de son orbite et de sa position actuelle, pp. 428-438. 3. Sur la planète qui produit les anomalies observées dans le mouvement d'Uranus - Cinquième et dernière partie, relative à la détermination de la position du plan de l'orbite (with) Planète de M. Le Verrier (letter from Galle to Le Verrier), pp. 657-663. 4. Planète de M. Le Verrier (letter from Challis to Le Verrier), pp. 715-716. 5. Comparaison des observations de la nouvelle planète, avec la théorie déduite des perturbations d'Uranus (with) LE VERRIER & ARAGO, Planète Le Verrier. Examen des remarques critiques et des questions de priorité que la découverte de M. Le Verrier a soulevées, pp. 741-755. 6. LE VERRIER & BINET, Note sur la détermination approximative de la distance du soleil à la planète Le Verrier, pp. 798-800. - Visit our website to see more images!
