Andreae, Johann Valentin (1586-1654).

first edition of this rare manual in which all aspects of the mathematical sciences and arts - geometry, arithmetic, statics, architecture, proportion, and so on - are treated by means of 110 'axioms' (many of them subdivided) matched by 110 plates (equally many subdivided into separate figures). 

The very brief texts are drawn from Euclid (geometry), Stifelius, Simon Jakob, G. Reinhold, and J. Lippius (arithmetic, music), Archimedes, Cardan, Ryff, Rivault and G.B. della Porta (statics), Copernicus, Maestlin, Roeslin and others (astronomy), S. Münster and B. Scultetus (Gnomonica, with drawings retouched by David Mageirus (?Koch)). For the section on clocks, he made use of Matthias Lösch, a clockmaker, for optics reference is made to Serlio (source of some of the illustrations) and Ryff, also used for the architecture section. For the section on military architecture he draws on Daniel Specklin and Claude Flamand, and for surveying and maps he used Mercator and others, as he uses Dürer for the final section on drawing and proportion.

On the verso of the title is a Biblical quotation relating to the last engraving of a maze (see illustration). The text to this engraving, with strong Rosicrucian overtones, reads: 'Quid ni labirintho finiremus. Ingressi sumus, oberravimus, reditum optamus. Sed nemo est, qui reducat. Sequuntur omnes: consequerentur omnes; harent omnes; Tu nos extrahe, ac a nobis tandem libera JESU CHRISTE'.