The small island Isla Robinson Crusoe or formerly Mas a Tierra or Juan Fernandez is located in the Pacific Ocean, about 600 kilometers west of the Chilean mainland. It is part of an archipelago which was discovered in 1574 by the Spanish seafarer Juan Fernandez and later named after
Lifting off like a pelican? The SB-2 Pelikan aircraft and its rusty start
During the Second World War, the Swiss government actively included ETH Zurich in its plans to promote an autonomous national aviation industry in Switzerland. The Federal Office of Aviation (now the Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA)) commissioned Professor Eduard
Glow with the Flow: William Hamilton’s Campi Phlegraei (Naples, 1776-1779)
As a British diplomat at the court of the Kingdom of Naples, Sir William Hamilton (1730-1803) had an ideal location to study the volcanoes of the region. Several times he climbed Mount Vesuvius and witnessed the violent and dangerous outbreaks of the time. To capture his observations of
Sebastian Münster, Cosmographia (Basel, 1544)
After 18 years in the making, Sebastian Münster (1488-1552), the German theologian and humanist, finally published Cosmographia in 1544, a monumental Renaissance work. He drew upon a wide variety of sources: on the one hand, Greek and Latin authors such as Herodotus,
Johann Georg Gichtel: Von den drei Prinzipien und Welten im Menschen (S.I., 1736)
Der deutsche Advokat, Mystiker und Spiritualist Johann Georg Gichtel (1638-1710) ist in erster Linie als Herausgeber der Werke Jakob Böhmes bekannt. Seine eigene Position ging dann aber weit über diejenige Böhmes hinaus, indem sich Gichtel der “völligen Ertödtung des Fleisches” und des Kampfs gegen Satan verschrieb.
Adolf Feller’s postcard collection
The postcard collection belonging to Adolf Feller (1876-1931), a manufacturer of electrical devices from Horgen, contains nearly 54,000 postcards from all over the world. Following Feller’s death in 1931, his daughter Elisabeth took over the collection until the 1970s. The majority of the postcards were sent between 1889 and 1954.
Aegidius Tschudi, Chronicon Helveticum (Basel, 1734-1736)
Many people associate Switzerland with William Tell, the country’s national hero. The world-famous legend, which was first documented in the 16th century, enjoyed particular popularity in the 19th century.
Johannes Kepler: Mysterium Cosmographicum (Tübingen, 1596)
German natural philosopher, theologist, mathematician, astronomer, astrologist and optician Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) is best known for his three laws of planetary motion.
Galileo Galilei: Dialogo […] dove ne i congressi di quattro giornate si discorre sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo telemaico e copernicano (Florenz, 1632)
Seiner Bedeutung für die Geschichte der Astronomie gemäss ist Galileis Dialogo gleich vierfach in der Sammlung Alte Drucke vorhanden: Die Erstausgabe von 1632, gedruckt von Giovanni Battista Landini in Florenz, eine mit anderen Werken zusammengebundene Ausgabe gedruckt von David Hautt in Strassburg (1635) und zwei von Jean Antoine Huguetan in Lyon gedruckte Ausgaben (1641).
Frozen lake, 1929 – iceskaters in the wintertime on a frozen Lake Zurich
Last Monday marked the provisional end to the minor lake freeze for the current winter season. Small lakes like Katzensee in Zurich Nord were cleared for walking on for precisely two days. The low temperatures from 2 to 18 January 2009 raised hopes that it would freeze over.