De Rerum Natura by Titus Lucretius Carus, Fridenperger: Verona, 28 Sept. 1486 (vellum)

Lucretius' work, in the form of an epic poem, tells of the theories of his teacher, the Greek philosopher Epicurus, demonstrating the workings of his model of a universe based on the atom as the fundamental particle. It is one of the books selected by Bern Dibner, the noted science book collector, to be included in his work, Heralds of Science as Represented by Two Hundred Epochal Books and Pamphlets Selected from the Burndy Library, all publications that “proclaimed new truths or hypotheses in science.” Most of these volumes were donated to the Smithsonian by the Burndy Library to establish the Dibner Library of the History of Science and Technology in what is now the National Museum of American History in 1976.