The Library, The Pharmacy, The Natural Science Laboratory, Mathematical Instruments, Astrononomy etc., also testify to Andreae's education in the humanities and natural sciences: he read Erasmus and Lipsiu, studied mathematics under Maestlin, and corresponded with Kepler until the latter's death in 1630. As Thompson has remarked, however, the work's 'blueprint for establishing a small community of scholar-craftsmen'-in contrast to the stratified castes of Utopia-marks it as 'a Lutheran alternative to the Jesuit collages of the counter-reformation, and a Christocentric alternative to the Rosicrucian myth' with which Andreae was also associated.

Like its famous predecessor, More's Utopia (1516), Andreae's Christianopolis describes the ideal Christian society from the perspective of a visiting narrator, in this case the shipwrecked pilgrim Cosmoxenus Christianus, who observes the city's inhabitants, social institutions and way of life. The volume includes a folding engraved plate, often missing, depicting two views of the perfect city: a bird's-eye view of its walls, courtyards, and central tower, together with an aerial blueprint of its symmetrical architectural layout. Very lightly browned as usual excellent copies in contemporary yapped vellum, spine lettered in ink early inscription in ink on upper margin of the Herculis Christiani luctae (bound first) 18th C notes on rear free end-paper 19th C bookplate of 'James Brown Thornton' on front paste-down.įine sammelband of four scarce first editions of works by the Renaissance theologian, Lutheran reformer, and self-proclaimed founding Rosicrucian Johann Valentin Andreae (1586-1654), including his celebrated Reipublicae Christianopolitanae, a Protestant vision of the Christian Utopia. Strasburg, heirs of Lazarus Zetzner, 1619. Civis Christianus, sive Peregrini quondam errantis restitutiones. Turris Babel sive Judiciorum de Fraternitate Rosaceae Crucis Chaos.

Christianopolis johann valentin andreae