Beschreibung:

MAURICE LOEWY (1833-1907) and PIERRE PUISEUX (1855-1928)
MAURICE LOEWY (1833-1907) and PIERRE PUISEUX (1855-1928) Atlas Lunaire . Brussels: Société Belge d'Astronomie, 1899 [-c.1910]. Small 2° (290 x 240mm). 71 half-tone prints after Loewy and Puiseux, each with printed tissue overlays; ?extra-illustrated with 3 smaller photogravures by Fillon & Heuse after the same; and extra illustrated with a map of the lunar craters from a later work. (Some headlines shaved by the binder, a few plates lightly creased, occasional light wear or light soiling.) Later half-cloth preserving the original printed wrappers from one part (boards bowed). THE RARE REDUCED-FORMAT EDITION, REPRODUCING ALL OF LOEWY AND PUISEUX'S FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHS at a more portable 2/5 scale, and issued in parts at roughly the same time as the first edition of 1896-1910. Loewy and Puiseux's was the first large-scale atlas of the moon, and 'the ultimate achievement of nineteenth-century astronomical photography' ( The Photobook ). It was only in the 1970s that images substantially better than those of Loewy and Puiseux were obtained. Because perfect weather conditions were needed, the project took 14 years to complete. During this period only 50 or 60 nights per year exhibited the ideal weather conditions, and from those nights only 4 or 5 usable negatives would be produced. RARE: ABPC and AE record no copy at auction; copies catalogued on WorldCat appear mainly incomplete, with between 35 and 53 plates only. Like the large-format edition, this edition comprises 71 plates, but this example is without text, perhaps as issued. Cf. The Photobook I, pp.54-5 (first edition).