A wide decorative woodcut headpiece at the top of the page features ornate symmetrical scrolling foliage, floral motifs, and vines.

TO THE

Most Serene & Most Potent

Prince and Lord,

LORD JAMES,

King of Great Britain, France, and

Ireland, Defender of the

Faith, etc.

My Most Merciful Lord.

A large ornamental woodcut initial 'C' featuring elaborate floral scrollwork within a square frame.

Why I should send these books of Harmonics original: "Harmonices"; referring to the study of mathematical proportions in music, nature, and the heavens to be published among men, away from the court of the most August Emperor Ferdinand II, the Holy Roman Emperor, my Lord—away from his Kingdoms and hereditary Austrian Provinces, and finally from Germany itself—sending them across the sea to present them to your most serene sight, O Illustrious King: I have had reasons partly present, and partly ancient.

First, I did not think this foreign to my duty; for since I earn the Emperor’s salary in the field of Mathematics, I wished to demonstrate even to those abroad how much care this Prince of the Christian Commonwealth The Holy Roman Empire bestows upon these most divine studies. It should be understood from the undisturbed progress of the "ornaments of Peace" a reference to the arts and sciences through these provinces, that the ominous rumor of internal war The Thirty Years' War, which began in 1618, one year before this publication will, along with the conflict itself, undoubtedly soon be extinguished. This current dissonance, though a little harsher than usual—just as in a moving Melody—is even now [resolving] into its plea- The text cuts off here at the end of the page; the catchword "uem" indicates the next word is "suauem," meaning sweet or pleasant.