Lettres À Une Princesse D'allemagne

EULER, Leonhard (1707–1783). Lettres à une princesse d'Allemagne sur divers sujets de physique & de philosophie . St. Petersburg: L’Académie Imperiale des Sciences, 1768–72. First edition of “a principal document of the Enlightenment” (Calinger); from an early St. Petersburg library for female scientists. The publication of Euler’s letters to the Princess Friederike Charlotte Leopoldine Louise of Brandenburg-Schwedt, to whom he had given lessons during his stay in Berlin, “had an immense success and profoundly influenced contemporary philosophy” (PMM 196, note). “The most exhaustive and authoritative science popularization written during the eighteenth century, the Lettres critically examined in greater depth than did other works the complex and changing major Enlightenment natural philosophies, the Cartesian, Newtonian, Leibnizian, and Wolffian, and presented each in terms understandable to the educated European reading public […] Their passion for learning reflects that period's faith in education, including support of female learning. The Lettres , with their insightful explanation of the sciences and his core religious and spiritual positions, offer probably the best rounded view of Euler's character” (Calinger). Calinger, Euler (2015); Houzeau & Lancaster 8897; PMM 196 (note); Honeyman 1074. Founded in the 1870s by the Russian government, the Bestuzhev Higher Women’s Courses were devised to allow women to study in Russia rather than having to go abroad. The courses ran continuously until 1918 when they became part of St. Petersburg State University. Three volumes, octavo (192 × 115mm). 12 folding woodcut diagrams, 1 full-page woodcut celestial chart, many in-text diagrams (vol. 3 quires C and H leaves bound out of order, occasional small stains). Early half sheep, marbled paper board, English lettering on spine in gold (rehinged, vol. 1 upper joint starting, vol. 1 upper hinge cracked, spines rubbed).

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