Scientific books for Christie’s New York Auction
Published June 14th, 2008
The collection is being sold by Richard Green, a retired physician and amateur astronomer from Long Island and includes works by Nicolaus Copernicus, Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sir Isaac Newton and Johnannes Kepler.
It is expected to bring $6 million at Christie’s New York auction on Tuesday.
A copy of Copernicus’ “De revolutionibus orbium coelestium” (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres), printed in 1543, is expected to bring the highest price, between $900,000 and $1.2 million. It puts forth Copernicus’ theory that the Sun — not the Earth — was at the center of the universe.
Christie’s calls the Copernicus volume “arguable the finest copy in private hands.”
