The Mariners Magazine; or, Sturmy's Mathematical and Practical Arts.

A sourcebook for Gulliver's Travels. First edition. 'This Mariners Magazine is a compendium of useful information and is essentially a course in practical mathematics. It was designed to give practical advice to seamen (and others). It did not provide the latest scientific thinking and limited itself to only the information to perform a given function' (Tomash & Williams S210). Examples with the volvelles are now scarce, and the most recent copy at auction was in 1998 (Sotheby's).

Captain Sturmy commanded ships sailing out of Bristol, mainly to Virginia and the West Indies. His experiences formed the basis for this book which was intended 'to provide his three brothers, his sons, and other young seamen with all they needed to know, even if their mathematical knowledge was restricted to arithmetic. The magazine was written in lively fashion, in the sections on seamanship the usual commands and responses being set out as dialogue between captain and crew (parts of this were lifted verbatim by Jonathan Swift for Gulliver's travels' (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography).

[The] 'work is composed of several books on the topics of navigation, instruments, surveying, gauging, astronomy, dialing, gunnery, fireworks, fortification and a summary of penalties applied for smuggling' (Tomash & Williams).

First edition, folio (28.8 x 19. cm); title page printed in red and black, frontispiece portrait, additional engraved title and 10 folding plates (some with unassembled volvelles), woodcut and engraved diagrams and illustrations, with the folding rule plate that is often missing, this example being the Edward Fage variant, without the pasted-over diagram seen in some copies on page 37 of chapter XXIV, 2 leaves inserted between 2D1-2, folding table, with blank leaf 3R4, portrait and additional title inserted on stubs, portrait possibly supplied, with short closed tears and restoration to outer margins, a few short splits to folding plates, scattered browning, soiling, and edge wear, worm hole to blank inner margin of 4c to end; contemporary calf, rebacked to style with spine gilt in compartments, red morocco label, calf worn, very good condition.

ESTC R23470; Tomash & Williams S210; Wing S6096.