TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS PRINCE AND LORD, LORD PHILIP, COUNT PALATINE OF THE RHINE, AND DUKE OF BOTH BAVARIAS,

etc., his most gracious Lord, Georgius Tansteter Collimitius, Royal Physician and Mathematician, sends greetings.

A large, historiated decorative initial 'C' depicting a scene with several figures in an interior architectural setting. One figure appears to be seated or reclining while others stand nearby.Since it has long been a custom from antiquity, which has descended even to this age of ours, that learned men—whenever they intended to publish either their own labors or the writings of others rescued by them from darkness and restored to light and, as it were, to life—should choose from among the whole multitude some singular man, either well-deserving of them or endowed with virtue, or himself learned and well-steeped in letters, and a student of that art which is treated in the book, under whose name their labors, whether their own or another's, might auspiciously go forth. Duly emulating their practice at the present time as especially becoming and honorable, O most illustrious Prince, I have determined to inscribe and dedicate to your Highness a work belonging to another, yet nonetheless distinguished and very useful, rescued from destruction first by my own effort, and then especially by yours, and now for the first time coming forth into the light. Especially since all the reasons for which others have individually inscribed their books unite in you. For first, I must confess that your Highness deserves this, and indeed far greater things than these. For I had previously learned from Peter Apian—a man of proven reliability and exceedingly skilled in mathematics—that your Highness is both greatly delighted by studies of this kind and is accustomed to devote effort to them from time to time. Then, in the past year, when the renowned and most powerful King Ferdinand spent the winter here—in whose courtly service you, a Prince, hold the principal place—you, drawn by mathematical interest, did not disdain to visit me at my home on several occasions; and not only did you skillfully set forth those first rudiments of that art with me, but you also discussed elegantly those more recondite and abstruse matters which require more accurate study and judgment. Furthermore, so many and so great are your virtues by which you remarkably shine, that if books were to be dedicated to you for each of them individually, no library, however copious and abundantly furnished, would ever be sufficient; and if I wished to name them one by one, I should surely exceed the limits of a letter. I shall commemorate this one singular and notable deed: that four years ago, when Vienna in Austria was ringed by a most heavy and perilous siege, with a vast army of Turks spread far and wide, you, having heard reports of the arrival and formidable attack of the enemy, of your own accord and with what forces you could suddenly gather, brought yourself in haste to Vienna before the most foul enemies had surrounded the city on every side. Indeed, in that city throughout the whole time of the siege, you so performed all the duties of defense that, fleeing no labor or danger by night or day at the standards, you were always mingled with the foremost and stood first yourself, and you repeatedly exhorted others to the walls that must be defended with a brilliant and manly speech, so that to speak bravely,