Catalogue Entry: THEM00121
Draft letter, Newton to Nicholas Tron, 17 May 1718, with unrelated notes on theology and mathematics.
Custodial History
Bought at the Sotheby sale by James Tregaskis & Sons for £10.10s. Acquired at some point by the collector Max Thorek, whose handstamp now appears on the manuscript. Offered for sale by R. Smythe of 26, Broadway, New York as Item 546 in a catalogue we have not yet succeeded in dating, with a reserve price of $75,000.
Sotheby Lot
SL169Contents
The letter acknowledges receipt from Ludovico a Ripa of his book 'de re Herbaria' [Historiæ Universalis Plantarum Scribendæ Propositum Addito Specimine (Padua, 1718; not listed by Harrison)]. The notes concern relations between Jewish and Gentile converts in the early Church and ancient Jewish church government, along with a fragment on the discovery of the calculus.
Related Material
The Smythe catalogue entry includes a partial but extensive transcript of the notes, an English translation of the letter, partial and largely illegible facsimile images of the manuscript, and a gross exaggeration of its rarity.
Letter to Tron listed as missing in NC, 6: 447.
