Lot n° 7
Estimation :
2000 - 2500
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 5 667EUR
FRÉDÉRIC II, king of Prussia. Autograph letter signed Freder - Lot 7
FRÉDÉRIC II, king of Prussia. Autograph letter signed Frederick to the physicist and philosopher Pierre-Louis de Maupertuis. Dresden, Dec. 20, 1748; one page in-4.
After having definitively established that the earth was flattened at the poles, Maupertuis, crowned with glory, had become a member of most of the learned societies of Europe. Frederick II had attracted him to Prussia in 1740 and had entrusted him with the presidency of the Academy of Sciences of Berlin.
The sovereign wrote to him from Dresden: "If it were not for the love of peace that keeps me here, I would have flown to Berlin a long time ago, but I flatter myself, my dear Maupertuis, to bring you the palms of peace and the much desired olive. I am so overloaded with business that for three days I have not been able to read my dear Cicero, and that I have been obliged to divorce myself from the Muses in order to devote myself solely to those occupations of which Pope so energetically depicts the true pettiness, and which only affect the vanity and ambition of kings..."
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