
16TH-CENTURY BOOKS

[ENCOMPASSING THE REFORMATIONS]
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B-Bibles
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An Important Copy Owned by THREE Star Theologians
(A COPY with a History). [Pseudo-Primasius]. ... In omnes D. Pauli epistolas commentarij. Lugduni: apud Seb. Gryphium, 1537. 8vo (18 cm, 7’’). [16], 653, [3] pp.
$1200.00
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The editio princeps of this important commentary on St. Paul’s epistles, attributed to Primasius of Hadrumetum by the editor Jean Gagney. It is now believed to be Cassiodorus’s revision of a commentary resulting from a compilation produced in the 5th century and revised by a Pelagian (probably Pelagius’s follower, Caelestius); Cassiodorus attributed it to Pope Gelasius and revised the Pelagian “errors” he spotted (Hovingh, 10).
This theory on authorship was definitively confirmed by an owner of this copy: Alexander Souter (1873–1949), professor at Aberdeen and the author of studies on early Latin commentaries on St. Paul’s epistles. For his theory, he relied on
the early 16th-century bibliographical note in this specific copy, which highlights the question and suggests two reasons why the work was not by Primasius, mentioning also the similar case of Pseudo-Jerome (Souter, 321).
Provenance: In his work, Souter called this copy “the Hort copy” as it was formerly in the library of F.J.A. Hort (1828–92), professor of divinity at Cambridge, who wrote a major edition of the Greek New Testament and commentaries on Romans and Ephesians. At the time Souter was writing, the copy was in the possession of Joseph Armitage Robinson (1858–1933), Dean of Wells, and the editor and commentator to St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians.
The autographs of the theologians F.J.A. Hort, Joseph Armitage Robinson, and A[lexander] Souter all appear on the volume's fly-leaf, with that leaf's verso also bearing a contemporary bibliographic manuscript note in the same hand as three marginalia and a contemporary inscription (price?) on the front free endpaper verso. Most recently, in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
From the Gryphius press, this characteristically neat and attractive production bears different versions of the printer’s device on its title-page and last leaf verso.
Adams P2094; Baudrier, VIII, 107; Gütlingen, V, 411; Souter, Pelagius’s Expositions of Thirteen Epistles of St. Paul (1922); Hovingh, Opera Omnia Desiderii Erasmi (2012), vol. 7. Contemporary (French?) calf, stub from 15th-century manuscript (Psalms) used as spine lining, boards rubbed affecting blind-tooling; volume expertly rebacked plain-style, sans labels, with corners repaired. Title and last leaf verso a little dusty; text otherwise remarkably clean, with light age-toning, occasional very minor marginal spotting, and a small worm trail in gutter of final gatherings affecting a few letters. Title note visible as inked to darkened fore-edge, long ago.
Added to its other pleasing points, this is a wide-margined copy. (41341)

Whoever Printed It It's
ATMOSPHERIC!
(A Bibliographical Puzzle). Decio, Filippo. Sermo editus per excellentissimu[m] ... Philippu[m] Deciu[m] … pro justificatione co[n]cilii Pisani nunc Mediolani reside[n]tis ... [Lyon?: Jacques Sacon?, ca.1512?]. 8vo (13.8 cm, 5.5’). [8] ff.
[SOLD]
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Obscure edition — probably one of two recorded copies only — of this conciliarist speech given in defence of the notorious “Conciliabulum of Pisa” (Council of Pisa), indicted against Pope Julius II by Louis XII of France, with the assistance of four cardinals. The jurist and humanist Filippo Decio (1454–1535), siding with the King whilst upholding his own orthodoxy, was asked to produce this oration a few weeks after the beginning of the assembly, to defend the synod which was being transferred to Milan for safety reasons. Decio justified the Council as a “healthy remedy” for church reform, and argued, in the wake of the medieval conciliary tradition, for its legitimacy and authority over the Pope. Julius II excommunicated the presiding cardinals in January 1512, calling for the Fifth Lateran Council in April.
A study of the type suggests that this edition was probably printed, covertly, by Jacques Sacon in Lyon. In 1512, the cardinals had moved from Milan to Lyon; Decio too arrived in Lyon in June 1512, and, a couple of months later, two of his juridical works were printed by Sacon. The
handsome woodcut on the title-page of this edition, which bears strong German influences, portrays cardinals, the Holy Roman Emperor, and the King of France, surmounted by the dove of the Holy Spirit. It was drawn after the woodcut on the first (probably Milanese) octavo edition of this pamphlet, ca.1511, another in quarto having been printed in Pavia.
Provenance: Most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Unrecorded in Gültlingen and Baudrier. Baldacchini, “Un enigma bibliografico” discusses Decius’s other French false imprints. Index Aurel. 150.792, Perrins-Warner n.210 and Sander 2398 record only the Milan edition of ca.1511/12. 19th-century suede wrappers, a little rubbed. Title-page, verso of last leaf, and edges a trifle dusty, occasional very minor marginal foxing, text block partly loosening.
Very nice. (40828)

Rime Pietose — De Luca Copy
Interestingly VARIOUS Management of the Woodcuts
(A Bit of an Experiment)? Bramicelli, Guglielmo, transl. Inni che si cantano tutto l'anno alle hore canoniche, nella Chiesa romana. Venetia: Giorgio Angelieri, 1597. 8vo (13.3 cm, 5.25"). [40] pp., 93 (i.e., 100) ff. (pagination erratic); illus.
$1975.00
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First edition: Catholic hymns, translated from Latin into Italian verse by a member of the Clerics Regular of Somasca (variously identified as either Bramiceli or Bramicelli). Many of the hymns open with small illustrations — totaling
42 in-text woodcuts— and the title-page features Angelieri's printer's device of an amphora watering a seedling, bearing the motto “A poco a poco.”
The woodcuts are notable not only for the variety of scenes they present but for a certain variety in presentation: Many of the images are presented with their edges visually defined in the normal way, essentially “ruled”; but some are presented as if paintings, within full Renaissance “picture frames” --- with the images themselves, inside, sometimes having their edges normally defined and sometimes floating entirely free. Yet other cuts are given framing at their sides or top and bottom, but not both!
Bramicelli's vernacular renditions were apparently unauthorized; one source claims that the Church ordered the book burned (Tentorio, Saggio storico sullo sviluppo dell'ordine somasco dal 1569 al 1650, p. 178). This may explain why the work is now
scarce, with WorldCat and NUC Pre-1956 locating only one U.S. institutional holding (Newberry), and only one additional one internationally. EDIT16 gives only ten Italian libraries as holding copies.
Provenance: From the collection of Don Tommaso De Luca (1752–1829), described by Alexander Roberson as “a priest of the old school . . . possessed of one of the finest libraries in all Northern Italy”; front free endpaper inked with “Exemplare proveniente dalla celebre Collezione de Luca. Veggasi suo Catalogo stampato, alla pag. 101, lin. 29.30" (referring to De Luca's 1816 Catalogo di una pregevole collezione di manoscritti e di libri a stampa delle più ricercate edizioni). Most recently in the library of of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
EDIT16 CNCE 7425. Not in Adams; not in Mortimer; not in Index Aurel. Contemporary marbled paper–covered limp wrappers, faded and rubbed overall; spine darkened and chipped, front cover with early inked numeral at upper center. Front hinge (inside) cracked, with uppermost of two sewing bands separated from vellum; front free endpaper with early bibliographic note in neatly inked Italian. Light waterstaining to lower outer corners of about 12 ff., scattered minor foxing.
A fascinating production. (38978)



A PERUVIAN INCUNABLE — In Spanish, Quechua, & Aymara from
the Press of
“Antonio Ricardo, primer impressor en estos Reynos del Piru”
Acosta, José de; Juan de Atienza (attrib. authors). Tercero cathecismo y exposicion de la doctrina christiana, por sermones. Para que los curas y otros ministros prediquen y enseñen a los Yndios y a las demas personas. Impresso ... en la Ciudad delos Reyes [i.e., Lima]: Por Antonio Ricardo, 1585. Small 4to in 8s (20.5 cm; 8.125"). [7 of 8], 215 ff., lacking title-leaf (supplied in facsimile) & final blank; 13 ff. supplied from another, shorter, copy.
$50,000.00
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Following the fall of the Inca Empire to Pizarro and his men, the
shaping of a new social order began but was complicated by a civil war between two factions of the conquering Spaniards. Nonetheless, the development of one of the preeminent colonies of the Spanish empire, there in the coastal and Andean regions of the west coast of South America, progressed at a steady pace.
The society that developed in Peru, as in Mexico, Guatemala, and elsewhere in the Spanish New World, was one of
parallel social systems governed by Spanish laws and royal appointed officials; the Spaniards transplanted their traditional social system from Iberia and the indigenous population maintained its own in modified form. Carefully nurtured points of commonality and interchange ensured that while the populations and cultures were essentially separate, the indigenous one did not develop beliefs and practices that would be in conflict with those of the dominant Hispanic culture.
To this end
it was necessary for there to be individuals in both societies who were fluent in each other's languages and could assist in legal, religious, and social matters. In Spanish society one principal group whose members were expected to learn either Quechua or Aymara, the two principal languages of the Inca empire, were the Catholic missionaries. But works in either of those languages were slow to appear in print and
the number of works in Peruvian indigenous languages printed in the 16th century lagged far behind the number of works in the languages of Mexico. The first two works in the languages of Peru were printed in Europe only in 1560. No more works appeared until 1584 and then they were printed in Peru itself.
In that year
Antonio Ricardo printed the first book in South America, the Doctrina christiana y catecismo para instruccion de los Indios. Antonio Ricardo was an Italian who began working as a printer in Mexico in 1570 in the shops of other printers, almost certainly principally in that of Pedro Ocharte. In 1577 he became the fifth independent printer in the New World but operated under his own name only until 1579, during which time he worked closely with the Jesuits and printed books for students at the Society of Jesus' Colegio de San Pedro y San Pablo; at the urging of the Society he left Mexico in 1580 to establish his press in Peru. There, however, because of a dispute between the Jesuits and the viceroy, he did not receive license to print until 1584, when the first thing he printed, at the insistence of the viceroy, was a four-page explanation of the change from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar. This was quickly followed by
three tri-lingual books in Spanish, Quechua, and Aymara, all works by members of the Society of Jesus. The Tercero cathecismo is only the third book printed in South America and it shows Ricardo as aware and proud of his position as the first printer in South America. He pointedly identified himself as such on the book's title-page: “Antonio Ricardo, primer impressor en estos Reynos del Piru.”
The Tercero cathecismo's importance is multifaceted and goes far beyond its place as an icon in American printing history, for it provided doctrinally approved sermons both for those priests serving the Spanish population who were less than proficient sermonizers and also, specifically, for those
priests and missionaries working among the indigenous population whose command of Quechua and/or Aymara was not sufficient for them to be safe and fluent deliverers of the word of God and instruction in Christian ethics and practices. Modern study of these sermons additionally considers which indigenous terms were used to convey European concepts (precursor to the Chinese rites controversy of the late 17th century Jesuit missionaries in China), which Spanish words became loan words in Quechua and Aymara, what indigenous practices were of concern to the religious authorities, and of course which dialect of each language was chosen to be the norm of proselytization.
Ricardo was fond of printing his texts with
a mix of type faces and a wide variety of large woodcut initials. The inventory of the type, ornamental letters, woodcut illustrations, etc., that he owned when he sold the press shows that he had amassed huge quantities of all of those elements of the black art. (The inventory is in the Manuscript Division of the New York Public Library, the gift of Edward Harkness.) The Tercero cathecismo prints the Spanish text in italic and the indigenous-language texts in roman, with the Spanish printed margin to margin at the top of the pages and the Quechua and Aymara below it in parallel columns to the left and right respectively. And yes, there is goodly use of several woodcut headpieces, many large woodcut initials (some historiated); curiously, no tailpieces.
Provenance: 18th-century ownership inscription in an upper margin of the library of Colegio de Santa Rosa; which one, not clear.
As one would expect of any book that was among the first productions of a press in a remote region, the Tercero cathecismo is a rare book. Searches of NUC Pre-1956, WorldCat, COPAC, CCPBE, and KVK locate only eight U.S., four European, and two South American libraries reporting ownership. However, we know of one other U.S. and one other European library owning copies.
Backer-Sommervogel, I, 34; Sabin 94838; Medina, Lima, 3; Vargas Ugarte, Impresos peruanos, 3; Johnson, The Book in the Americas, 34; Medina, Lenguas quechua y aymará, 4; Viñaza 81. Recased in possibly original limp vellum; new free endpapers and fly-leaves; evidence of long-gone ties. Title-page in facsimile. Thirteen leaves supplied from a shorter copy (ff. 57, 138, 143, 146, 151, 135, 160, 161, 168, 186, 191, 194, 199); heavy staining to ca. fol. 25 and again at the end, other staining scattered. Worming, mostly pinhole but some meander, with loss of letters, parts of words, and occasionally whole words, seldom with injury to reading; a few leaves with repaired margins and repairs to wormed areas.
Obviously a sophisticated copy and one that has seen hardships, nonetheless, a copy ready to repay ownership and study. (36505)

Title-Border & Initials by Hans Baldun Grien
Ex–Donaueschigen Library
Adelphus, Johannes, Jakop Wimpheling (comm.). Seque[n]tiarum lucule[n]ta interpretatio: nedu[m] scholasticis, sed [et] ecclesiasticis cognitu necessaria. [Strassburg: Knoblouch], 1513. 4to (21 cm, 8.25"). CXXXVI, [4], LXXX ff.
$2750.00
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Strassbourgh printer Knoblouch here produces
the first edition of the Humanist commentaries of Johannes Adelphus and Jakop Wimpheling on the Sequences of the Mass and the Hymns of the Breviary, respectively.
The Corpus Christi Watershed dot org website explains the Sequences: “First appearing in the ninth century, the sequences rose to a level of fair prominence in the medieval period. Their heyday lasted until the liturgical reforms enacted during the Counter-Reformation. At the height of their usage, there were proper sequences for nearly every Sunday and feast day (outside penitential seasons). Their usage varied widely, however, since the sequences were never obligatory.” Simply put, they are the liturgical hymns of the Mass, and occur on festivals between the Gradual and the Gospel. By contrast, the Hymns belong to the Breviary and are fixed.
The text and commentary of the Sequences are here paired with those of the Hymns as the second part of the volume, with a separate title-page but signatures continuous, titled “Hymni de tempore [et] de sanctis: in ea[m] forma[m] qua a suis autoribus scripti sunt denuo redacti: [et] s[ecundu]m legem carminis dilige[n]ter emendati atq[ue] interpretati.” The Hymns fill the final 80 leaves.
Adelphus's commentary on the Sequences is a reworking of the familiar medieval commentary with the vocabulary brought up to date to make it less scholastic. Adelphus also occasionally adds contemporary references, including at least one allusion to his own translation into German of Sebastian Brant's De laude Hierosolymae. The most thorough revision this edition makes is to the sequence-commentary notes on grammar and linguistic usage, and there are additional references to classical models of expression.
Wimpheling introduces his commentary to the Hymns with prefatory comments in which he supports the contribution that training in the arts of literary expression can make to a proper understanding of religious texts. He promotes the pedagogic virtues of the hymns themselves; in particular, he notes that the diversity of meter they employ makes them apt vehicles for teaching Latin prosody while the grammatical and rhetorical skills acquired from studying them will in turn lead to a sharper, more sophisticated and more accurate reading of hymns as texts of Christian spirituality, and therefore to a deeper piety.
Hans Baldung Grien provided the title-page woodcut boarders [Oldenbourg 236] and two large historiated initials, one at the beginning of each part, respectively: the Death of the Virgins [Oldenbourg 232] and the Adoration [Oldenbourg 221].
On this important edition, see Ann Moss, “Latin Liturgical Hymns and their Early Printing History” (Humanistica Louvaniensia, XXXVI [1987], 125-28).
Provenance: Impressed into the front board are the initals L C V of the Franciscan convent of Villigen; upon suppression of the convent, to the Donaueschigen Library, its oval stamp on the verso of the title-page; that library sold in 1994; later in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Proctor 10081; Adams L1126; VD16 S5978 & H6503; Index Aurel. 100.597; Schmidt, Knobloch, VII, 82; Ritter 5; Oldenbourg, Hans Baldung Grien, L28. Original wooden boards, rebacked in 19th-century pigskin with old paper label and evidence of single missing clasp; provenance marks as above. Variable old water- and dampstaining, no tattering or tears, title-pages lovely. (40642)

Enhanced by a Fan of St. John — In a Contemporary Binding & with
78 Woodcuts
Aemilius, Georg. Evangelia quae consueto more dominicis et aliis festis diebus in ecclesia leguntur. Coloniae Agrippinae: Ad intersignium Monocerotis [Walther Fabritius], 1566. 8vo (16 cm, 6.3"). [176] ff.; illus.
$2250.00
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Profusely illustrated juvenile lectionary edited by student of Melanchthon and Lutheran theologian Georg Aemilius (a.k.a. Aemylius or Emilius, 1517–69). Decorated with
78 in-text woodcuts, a scarce few repeated, the Latin text is printed in single columns using an italic font with the occasional shouldernote in Greek and four historiated initials. First published in 1549, this text was extremely popular in its day, with at least nine different editions by 1579, though all editions are now uncommon and this one quite scarce; searches of WorldCat and NUC reveal only one U.S. institution reporting ownership.
Binding: Contemporary goat over thin beechwood boards, inked paper label on spine, raised bands surrounded by triple fillets; covers elaborately stamped with a frame of fillets and a medallion-portrait roll around repeated rows of three floral sprays.
Evidence of Readership: An early reader has underlined and added some marks of emphasis and words in an early hand to seven leaves of text, all excerpts taken from the Gospel of John.
Provenance: Two ownership and one duplicate release rubber-stamps appear on the title-page verso, the first from the Universitätsbibliothek München dated between 1800 and 1826; most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
VD16 E 4570. Not in Adams; not in Index Aurel. Bound as above, rubbed and cracked with losses of leather and board extremities; bands and sewing tabs visible. No pastedowns; front free endpaper creased, front fly-leaf with pencilled note. Light age-toning with marginal and gutter waterstaining of varying darkness throughout; a few chipped edges, creased corners, or uneven edges; one short marginal tear. Provenance and readership indicia as above, else clean.
Well used and in fact the more interesting for that. (38914)
For “EVIDENCE of READERSHIP,” click here.

The Editio Princeps
Aeschylus. [7 lines in Greek romanized as] Aischylou tragodiai hex. Prometheus desmotes. Hepta epi Thebais. Persai. Agamemnon. Eumenides. Hiketides. [then in Latin] Aeschyli tragoediae sex. [colophon: Venetiis: In aedibvs Aldi et Andreae soceri, 1518]. 8vo (15.8 cm, 6.25"). 113, [1] ff.
$9750.00
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Editio princeps of Aeschylus, edited by Franciscus Asulanus and printed at the Aldine press. As the cataloguer at the Brigham Young University Library notes, “The manuscript that Asulanus used was defective, lacking the end of Agamemnon and the beginning of the Choephori, so that in this edition they are treated as one play under the title Agamemnon.”
The Aldine printer's device (version A2) is on title-page and verso of last leaf. The text of the plays is printed in the Aldine Greek face Gk4 (first used in the 1502 Sophocles) and Torresani's “to the reader” in Aldine italic face I1:79. There are spaces with guide letters for capitals but these were not accomplished by an illuminator.
Binding: Recent full red morocco, round spine with raised bands accented by gilt rules above and below each band, “Aldus, 1518" in gilt at base of spine. Aldine device in gilt on both covers. Marbled endpapers. Top edge gilt, other edges red.Provenance: From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Renouard, Alde, p. 85, no. 9; UCLA, Aldine Press: Catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy Collection (2001), 164; Kallendorf & Wells, Aldine Press Books, 157; EDIT16 CNCE 328; Index Aurel. 100.913; Adams A262. Binding as above. Light waterstaining to foremargins, perhaps more than occasional but not throughout; in fact, a clean and handsome copy. (40776)
For GREEK & LATIN CLASSICS, click here.
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Aeschylus from the Royal Printer
Aeschylus. [title in Greek, transliterated as] Aischylou Prometheus desmotes, Hepta epi Thebais, Persai, Agamemnon, [Choephoroi], Eumenides, Hiketides. Parisiis: Ex officina Adriani Turnebi Typographi Regii, 1552. 8vo (17 cm, 6.75"). [8], 211, [1] pp.
[SOLD]
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First Turnèbe edition of Aeschylus' complete works, here with a dedication by the French humanist himself and a two-page “Bios Aischylou tou poietou,” following the first Aldine edition of 1518. Adrien Turnèbe (1512–65) was chair of Greek at the College Royal in France and succeeded Robert Estienne as Royal Printer for Greek (although his appointment was contested by Charles Estienne). Here, according to Dibdin, he “very materially” corrected the Aldine text, and added a table of various readings.
The text is printed in mostly single columns using the “Cicero” Greek font of Garamond's grecs du roi, with foliated headpieces and decorative initials at the start of each section and Turnèbe's basilisk device on the title-page; this offering is the variant with A3 and A4 signed. Following the editio princeps, “Agamemnon” and “Choephori” are conflated.Provenance: From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear of both book and housing.
Adams A263; Mortimer, French 16th-Century Books, 3; Brunet, I, 77; Schreiber, Catalogue 37, no. 2; Dibdin, Greek and Latin Classics, p. 237; Hoffmann, Bibliographisches Lexicon der gesammten Literatur der Griechen, I, p. 32; Gruys Early Printed Editions (1518-1664) of Aeschylus, no. II-3 (p. 31-46). On Turnèbe, see: Renouard, Imprimeurs parisiens. 19th-century speckled calf, board edges with gilt zigzag rolls, all edges speckled red; recently rebacked, top edge darkened, boards worn with loss of most gilt, new endpapers with some discoloration and one pencilled phrase. Housed in a navy blue cloth clamshell case with two gilt red leather spine labels. Title-page and first few leaves affected by two unsuccessful leaf repairs leading to chipping, glue action, and a few tears; remainder of text with several pagination errors, a handful of spots, one edge tear from paper manufacture, and one waterstained bottom corner. Ownership label as above, a few leaves with light marks in pencil, one underline in ink. (38365)
For GREEK & LATIN CLASSICS, click here.
For LITERATURE, click here.
For THEATER/THEATRE, click here.

Brunet: “Belle Édition” — Sole Italian Estienne — Tall Copy
Alamanni, Luigi. La coltivatione di Luigi Alamanni al christianissimo re Francesco Primo. Parigi: Ruberto Stephano, 1546. 8vo (20.8 cm, 8.2"). [2], 154, [2] ff.
$1875.00
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First edition of Alamanni’s “famous didactic poem on the care of fields and gardens” (Schreiber, Estiennes), inspired by Virgil’s Georgics. The author was a Florentine-born humanist, poet, and diplomat who spent much of his life in the service of Francis I and Henry II of France, and who — possibly as a peace offering for having once participated in a conspiracy against her father — dedicated the present work to the Dauphine, Catherine de’ Medici.
Set in Simon de Colines’s Great Primer Chancery Italic, this poetic tribute to agriculture is
the only work Estienne printed in Italian. Schreiber notes that the tallest copy he had seen measured 8 1/4", with the current example coming very close to that; the dedication, errata, and privilege are all present here.
Provenance: Front pastedown with bookplates of Fratelli Salimbeni (with shelving number) and of “G.P.C.” (with woodcut image of Pegasus and motto “Nec adversa retorquent”); front fly-leaf with early inked annotation “H.III.161" and lined-through (still partially legible) inscription “Bibliotheque Vallicellane”; title-page with early inked inscription “Petri Salvati - V.” surrounding printer’s vignette, and obscured inscription in lower portion. Later in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Adams A409; Brunet, I, 125; Renouard, Estienne, 68:22; Schreiber, Estiennes, 88. Later vellum, spine with gilt-stamped red leather title-label and gilt-stamped blue leather publication label; vellum with minimal dust-soiling and traces of wear to extremities, two bottom-most spine compartments with later replacement (blank) vellum “labels,” one now starting to peel slightly. All edges stained blue. Bookplates and inscriptions as above; front free endpaper with later pencilled annotations (one giving incorrect Adams reference). One early inked marginal annotation. Pages gently age-toned, with intermittent minor foxing to margins; final leaf with small paper flaws in lower margin.
An attractive copy of an interesting and significant volume. (37916)

A 16th-Century Tour of Italy Venice Is an Island
Alberti, Leandro. Descrittione di tutta l'Italia & isole pertinenti ad essa. In Venetia: Appresso Gio. Maria Leni, 1577. 4to (21.7 cm, 8.5"). 2 vols. in 1. [303], 503, [1(blank)], 69 (i.e., 96), [4] ff.
$2500.00
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Early, expanded edition, following the first of 1550: An important and widely read account of Italy, written by a Dominican monk and Bolognese scholar who spoke at length about his home city in addition to the other major regions of the country. The Catholic Encyclopedia (1917) online notes that the work contains “many valuable topographical and archaeological observations.”
Nicely printed in italic type (without maps), the work has a good index. The separate title-page of vol. II gives Isole appartenenti alla Italia, dated 1576. Venice is treated here, as an island, not as part of “the mainland.”
Adams A475; Index Aurel. 102.349. Contemporary vellum, worn and darkened, lacking ties. Hinges (inside) with insect damage causing partial opening, text block starting to pull away from spine. Front free endpaper with two inked ownership inscriptions, one dated 1620 and one 1898. Small area of worming to upper inner margins of about 40 leaves, minor and not approaching text. Scattered instances of early inked underlining and a very few marginalia, pages otherwise pleasingly clean. Ready for many more years of use! (26501)

Lovingly Read Copy of a Book
Both Praised & Pilloried
by Paulus Manutius
Alcionio, Pietro. Petri Alcyonii Medices legatus de exsilio. [colophon: Venetiis: In Aedieus Aldi et Andreae Asulani, 1522]. 8vo (20.3 cm, 8"). [70] ff.
$3875.00
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First edition of Alcionio's controversial Ciceronian dialogue on the nature of exile, set in 1512 and taking place among Pope Leo X, the future Pope Clement VII (Alcionio's patron, at the time of writing still known as Giulio de' Medici), and Lorenzo, the Duke of Urbino. Venetian humanist and translator Alcionio (1487–1527, a.k.a., Alcinio, Alciono, or Alcyonius) was probably working as a
corrector for the Aldine press when this was published; he later went on to become Professor of Greek at Florence before following his patron to Rome. Paulus Manutius claimed that portions were actually plagiarized from an unknown copy of Cicero's De Gloria which Alcionio subsequently destroyed, a claim that unjustly tarnished Alcionio's reputation during his lifetime though later proven to be false; and the praise of his Latin implied by that led Brunet to note that the “accusation est le plus bel éloge que l'on ait pu faire de l'ouvreage d'Alcyonius.”
The text is printed in single columns using italic type with the iconic Aldine device on the title-page and final page of text; corrections and a register precede the colophon. This copy also retains the two internal blanks.
Evidence of Readership: A reader has added marginal notes, brackets, or underlinings in an early hand on almost every page of text.
Provenance: From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Adams A633; Brunet, I, 153; EDIT16 CNCE 859; Graesse, I, 64; Kallendorf & Wells, Aldine Press Books, 194; Renouard, Alde, p. 95, no. 6; UCLA, Aldine Press: Catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy Collection (2001), 215. On Alcionio, see: Contemporaries of Erasmus, I; Treccani (online). Modern half vellum and brown paper over boards, all edges speckled red; vellum foxed, paper dust-soiled with spots and stains. Very light waterstaining throughout, light to moderate marginal foxing somewhat less generally. Evidence of readership and booklabel as above; ink quite faded, some marginalia trimmed at edges, with two corners also slightly shaved.
A well-read and much-marked copy of a book with a fascinating history of reception. (39423)

“Scroungers” &
Their Rights in 13th-Century ARAGON
(Still Scrounging/Foraging in 1542)
Almudevar (Spain). Manuscript document, on paper. In Latin. Aragon: 5 May 1542. Small 4to (21.9 cm; 8.675"). [5] pp.
$775.00
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Boccaccio's Language
Catalogued & Cross-Referenced — A Poet's Copy
Alunno, Francesco. Le ricchezze della lingua volgare. In Vinegia: [colophon: In casa de Figliuoli di Aldo], 1543. Folio (32.7 cm, 12.875"). 225, [1] ff.
$2500.00
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First edition of grammarian, calligrapher, and Petrarchan scholar Alunno's glossary of all the words used in the works of Boccaccio, with examples of their uses and citations to the works and pages wherein they are found, these
cross-referenced as often now is not noted with their uses in Dante, Petrarch, Amedo, and Philocolo. The prefatory matter includes letters to the reader from both the Aldine Press and the author, a dedication to Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, notes on the organization of the text, numerous finding aids (word lists of homophones, foreign cognates, proverbs, and Italian dialect words), and more. Renouard notes of the work's popularity that “dans son temps, fut en grande estime, et eut un grand nombre de lecteurs,” which probably explains its reprinting in 1551, 1555, and 1557. Here, the Italian text is set in double columns using mostly italic and some roman type, with unaccomplished guide letters and catchwords; the iconic Aldine device appears within a foliate frame of four grotesques on the title-page and final text leaf. This is only the second appearance of this version of the device (B1), the first having been in Calepino's Dictionarium of 1542.
Provenance: Ink signature of Janus Broukhusius appears on the title-page in an early hand; a.k.a. Joan van Broekhuizen, 1649–1707, he was a Dutch man of letters known for his poems in Latin. Most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
EDIT16 CNCE 1308; Adams A842; Index Aurel. 104.190; Kallendorf & Wells, Aldine Press Books, 288; UCLA, Aldine Press: Catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy Collection (2001), 312; Goldsmid, Aldine Press at Venice, 283; Renouard, Alde, 127, no. 2; Graesse, Trésor de Livres Rares, I, p. 88. 19th-century Cambridge-style calf, rebacked harmoniously in speckled calf with gilt-stamped compartments and three red leather labels. Board edges with gilt fillet, turn-ins with gilt roll of two leaf designs; boards gently rubbed and refurbished, new endpapers. Light age-toning throughout with faint indications of old water exposure narrowly along top edge of upper margins and darker but still light waterstaining elsewhere marginally; otherwise, minutest wormtracking at bottom edge of bottom margins in two gatherings, occasionally a minor stain, and a good many upper corners very lightly creased across. Also present are two témoins and a few examples of paper flaws from manufacture or incomplete trimming. Provenance indicia as above, small pencil notations on title-page verso and first text leaf.
A scholarly work in vernacular language on vernacular language, from a scholarly press; furthermore a handsome publication, and in a handsome copy with wide handsome margins. (38897)

A Powerhouse Trio on Celibacy & Virginity — From the Aldine Press at Rome
Ambrose, Saint; Saint Jerome; & Saint Augustine. De virginitate[,] opuscula sanctorum doctorum, Ambrosii, Hieronymi, et Augustini. Quae sint ex antiquis exemplaribus emendata, & quae varie legantur, in extremo libro ostendimus. Romae: Apud Paulum Manutium, Aldi F., 1562. 4to (21.8 cm, 8.5"). 109, [7] ff.
$2250.00
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Brought together here are St. Ambrose's De virginitate, St. Jerome's Epistola ad Demetriadem de virginitate servandra, and St. Augustine's De sancta virginitate, three important works by three Church Fathers on celibacy and virginity, concerns of the early church that greatly affected the life of early clergy and nuns and had significant ramifications for laity as well. The Roman Aldine press essentially served as an extension of the papacy, which capitalized on its fame to disseminate — with great cachet — Vatican-approved texts in the publication war that was such an integral part of the Protestant and Catholic Reformations, this work being no exception.
This neatly printed text has single columns with unaccomplished guide letters and shouldernotes using roman font; the iconic Aldine device appears on the title-page and an errata list appears in double-column format at the end.
Provenance: The printer's mark of Jan Baptiste Verdussen II depicting a stork feeding a snake to another stork with the Latin motto “Virtus pietas homini tutissima,” which can be dated between 1659 and 1759, has been excised from another source and affixed to the front pastedown (possibly as a bookplate, as speculated by the Provenance Online Project); this title is later listed in the auction catalogue of Jean-Baptiste Verdussen III's book collection, suggesting this copy may have belonged to the Verdussen family. Two early inked signatures of G.J. Enoch and I.F. Vanderelie also appear on the front endpapers. Most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Searches of WorldCat and NUC located only four U.S. libraries reporting ownership (CLU, LNT, MnCS, UPB).
Adams A950; EDIT16 CNCE 16242; Index Aurel. 104.682; Renouard, Alde, p. 186, no. 7; UCLA, Aldine Press: Catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy Collection (2001), 678. Not in Kallendorf & Wells, Aldine Press Books. On the Aldine press at Rome, see: Curt Buhler, “Manutius and His First Roman Printings,” Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, 46, pp. 209–14. 19th-century polished calf, spine stamped in gilt with two gilt-stamped leather title-labels, covers framed with a dog-tooth roll, two gilt fillets, and small fleurons at corners; gilt floral rolls to board edges and turn-ins, all edges stained red, with marbled endpapers. Binding rubbed and refurbished, one leather spine label chipped and the other removed; spotting on endpapers, evidence of a removed bookplate at back. Mostly light offsetting of text throughout, intermittent mild to moderate unobtrusive waterstaining (including to title-page) and other spotting; title-page and eight more leaves of text with marginal repairs, one gutter showing narrow band of discoloration (possibly glue action). Provenance indicia as above, two pencilled endpaper notes.
An important collection from an interesting era of the Aldine Press; and a strong, in fact quite handsome copy. (37366)

Advice on All Sorts of Things
Andrelini, Publio Fausto. P. Fausti Andrelini foroliuiensis Hecatodistichon. [Paris]: V[a]enundatur a M. Nicolao De Barra, [1519]. 4to (19.7 cm, 7.75"). [30] pp. (final blank lacking).
$2500.00
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Posthumous — but still early — edition of Andrelini's collection of epigrams addressing a variety of groups and topics, including readers, sleep, and faith; here in
the first edition edited by Jean Vatel and with his commentary. Andrelini (ca. 1462–1518) was an Italian humanist, friend of Erasmus (until a dramatic break in 1511), and poet royal to both Charles VIII and Queen Anne of Brittany. Vatel was a similarly intriguing Renaissance man — the “data” page of the website of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France designates him, “Clerc, humaniste, professeur de grec, traducteur et commentateur, éditeur, dessinateur de caractères typographiques et imprimeur-libraire.” Andrew Pettegree and Malcolm Walsby's bibliography of pre-1601 French books shows that Vatel was greatly interested in Andrelini and edited at least a dozen of his works; his commentary for this text was subsequently reprinted numerous times in the 16th and 17th centuries.
The text is neatly printed in two different sizes of roman font with one decorative and one historiated initial (a Virgin and Child); a sizable printer's device appears on the title-page. Searches of the NUC, WorldCat, and COPAC reveal only one U.S. institution (Yale) reporting owning this edition.
Provenance: From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Moreau, Éditions parisiennes du XVI siècle, II, 1972; Brunet, I, 271–2; Graesse, Trésor de livres rares, I, 121; not in Adams. On Andrelini, see: Contemporaries of Erasmus, I; Pettegree & Walsby, French Vernacular Books: Books Published in France before 1601, 53120. Modern red foliate patterned paper–covered boards with gilt orange leather spine label, final blank lacking. Short interior tear without loss to title-page (perhaps a paper flaw?); light waterstaining and/or offsetting from old binding to upper outer corners and a little dust-soiling or creasing (the latter perhaps in the press). Light pencilling on one endpaper and one pencilled word on final page.
In fact withal a very pleasing little book. (38015)

Printing for “the Other Side”?
Apostolic canons. [first four words in Greek, transliterated as] Kanones ton agion apostolon. Canones sanctoru[m] apostolorum. Unà cum
latina interpretatione. Parisiis: Apud Andream Wechelum sub Pegaso, in vico Bellouaco, 1556. 4to (23 cm, 9"). 27, [1] pp.
$850.00
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The Apostolic Canons or Ecclesiastical Canons of the Holy Apostles is an important collection of
85 ancient ecclesiastical decrees concerning the government and discipline of the Early Christian Church, here printed by a Reformation supporter. Andreas Wechel also printed the works of French humanists Petrus Ramus and Nicholas Durand de Villegagnon before narrowly avoiding the St. Batholomew’s Day massacre thanks to Hubert Languet. He later moved to Frankfort, and died in 1581.
This offering is printed in single columns, with Greek text and Latin commentary surrounded by mostly Greek shouldernotes; Wechel’s printer’s device appears on the title- and final pages.
Searches of WorldCat, NUC, and COPAC reveal
no copies of this edition in a U.S. institution, and only one internationally in Rome.
Evidence of Readership: An early reader has added eight notes, one of which has been slightly trimmed through rebinding, that reference the Bible or other rule-sources.
Provenance: Early inked note on title-page reads “Ex. Bibl. S. Bern, Fulient. Paris”; institutional rubber-stamps (including a release stamp) of the Bibliothèque Impériale of Paris on title-page and three leaves of text. Most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
On Wechelus, see: Renouard, Imprimeurs parisiens, p. 435. Modern paste paper–covered boards, spine with gilt-lettered brown leather spine label. Moderate age-toning with spotting on first and last few leaves; faint waterstaining darkening to more noticeable towards the end, covering perhaps a third of the page; provenance and readership markings as above, with one rubber-stamp lightly offsetting onto facing leaf. (37909)

The Best of 16th-Century Italian Satire
Ariosto, Ludovico, & others; Francesco Sansovino, ed.
Sette libri di satire di Ludovico Ariosto, Hercole Bentivogli, Luigi Alemanni, Pietro Nelli,
Antonino Vinciguerra, Francesco Sansovino, ed altri scrittori. Venice: Appresso Fabio, &
Agostin Zopini fratelli, 1583. 8vo (14.6 cm, 5.75"). [8], 206, [1] ff. (lacking original final
blank).
$500.00
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Later edition of collected satires by famous Italian authors, edited by one of them,
Francesco Sansovino (1521–86).
Sansovino dedicates this collection to the historian Camillo Portio (Porzio, 1526 – ca.
1580), and introduces it with an essay on the material of satire, which he breaks down as “pure
simplicity, with severe acerbity, sometimes mixed with a bit of salt, or with some feature [that is]
tasty, and acute.” Prior to this, Sansovino also worked on the satires of Ariosto (1474–1533),
separately published.
The text is divided into sections by author, each of whom the editor introduces with a
brief biography. A short abstract printed in roman precedes each poem, printed in italic. Fine
woodcut head- and tailpieces, and a variety of initials in historiated, patterned, and factotum
designs, decorate the text; and the title-page features the woodcut printers' device of Truth
personified, flanked by an eagle, a lion, a bull, and an angel, representing the Four Evangelists.
Provenance: Ownership inscription on front fly-leaf of Luigi Pagani Cesa, possibly the
Italian jurist born at Belluno in 1855, who served as a member of Parliament for 1904–13; and
the words “penso che” (“I think that . . .”) written above, in an earlier hand?
Adams A1691; CNCE 2806. Later glazed cream-colored boards, title and date
inked on upper spine, small paper label on lower spine, marbled red edges; boards soiled and
front joint opening. One spot of worming on front pastedown and on colophon leaf; traces of
former mounting on colophon leaf verso. Title-page with one letter added in manuscript (o, in
Bentivoglio). Trimmed close at margins almost grazing headline on a few leaves. Very minor
stains on a few leaves, generally bright and crisp.
(30836)

Erotic Letters Classic Greek PLANTIN PRESS
Aristaenetus. [title-page in Greek, transliterated as] Aristainetou epistolai erotikai. tinà ton palaion heroon epitaphia. E bibliotheca C.V. Ioan. Sambuci. Antuerpiae: Ex officina Christophori Plantini, 1566. 4to (20.5 cm; 8"). 95, [1 (blank)] pp.
$2750.00
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Editio princeps of this late fifth / early sixth century collection of love/erotic letters. Both Voet and Brunet attribute them to Aristaenetus because the first is addressed by him to Philokalos; it is entirely possible, however, that the array are from different authors. Brunet says, “Ce lettres sur les aventures amoureuses racontees quelquefois d'une maniere assez libre.”
The text was edited from a manuscript in his personal collection by János Zsámboki (a.k.a., Johannes Sambucus), the Hungarian humanist scholar (1531–84) whose library formed the basis for the manuscript collection of the Austrian National Library.
Printed at the Plantin Press entirely in Greek (except for the imprint information), using Greek type commissioned from Robert Granjon, this bears one of the variant Plantin printer's devices on the title-page. It was printed with guide letters, although none have been supplied in manuscript by a scribe.
Evidence of readership: Scattered marginalia in Greek and Latin, sometimes correcting a word in text or expanding on same; other times citing a page in a different book.
Provenance: From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Voet 593; Graesse, Trésor de Livres Rares, I, 204; Brunet, I, 448; Schweiger, I, 44; Index Aurel. 107.600; Adams A1692. Surprisingly not in Legrand, Bibliographie Hellenique. Disbound; now in modern wrappers. A very nice, clean copy with occasional light age-toning. (37768)
Two Church Fathers Two Scholar Printers
An Apparatus by Erasmus
Athanasius, Saint, Patriarch of Alexandria. Athanasii Episcopi Alexandrini sanctissima, eloquentissma que opera ... que omnia olimia[m] latina facta Christophoro Porsena, Ambrosio Monacho, Angelo Politiano, interpretibus, una cum doctissima Erasmi Roterodani ad pium lectorem paraclesi. [bound with another work as below]. Parisiis: Joanne Paruo [i.e., Jean Petit] , [1519]. Folio extra. [6], 255, [66] ff. [bound with] Basil, Saint, Bishop of Caesarea. Basilii Magni Caesariensium in Cappadocia Antistitis sanctissimi opera plane diuina, variis e locis sedulo collecta: & accuratio[n]e ac impe[n]sis Iodici Badii Asce´sii recognita & coimpressa, quorum index proxima pandetur charta. [Paris: Venundantur eidem Ascensio [i.e., Badius Ascensius, 1520]. Folio extra. [10], 178 ff.
$3850.00
Click any image where the hand appears on
mouse-over, for an enlargement.
Two editions of Church Fathers from two scholar/printer presses. St. Athanasius's text was translated into Latin by three noted Renaissance scholars, edited by Nicholas Beraldus, and has the added prestige of apparatus by Erasmus. The title-page is printed within a four-piece woodcut border, with the title in red and black, and the page bears the famous Petit printer's device.
The text enjoys handsome typography, side- and shouldernotes, and large woodcut initials.
The St. Basil is from Badius Ascensius's press and he acted as the editor, the translators having been Johannes Argyropoulos, Georgius Trapezuntius, and others. The title-page uses the same four-part woodcut title-page border as found on the St. Athanasius, bound in at the front, which makes much sense given the familial relationship between Ascensius and Petit.
Athanasius: Index Aurel. 109.388; Moreau, II, 1982. Basil: Index Aurel. 114.440; Renouard, Ascensius, II, 145/146; Moreau, II, 2246. Alum-tawed pigskin, elaborately tooled in blind over wooden boards with metal and leather clasps; one clasp perished. Binding with one corner tip broken off; small hole in leather on rear board; dust-soiled. Inside, some early marginalia and underlining in red; narrow arc of old, light waterstaining to fore-edges of one part. Pages generally very clean. (19915)

His Treatise Chrysopoeia — On Transmutation of Metals into Gold — Is Anticipated Here
Augurelli, Giovanni Aurelio. I. Aurelius Augurellus [poemata]. Venetiis: In aedibus Aldi, 1505. 8vo (16.3 cm; 6.375"). [256] pp.
$8250.00
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First edition of the Italian humanist and alchemist Giovanni Aurelio Augurelli's collected poetry, containing Ioannis Aurelii Augurelii iambicus liber primus, secundus; Sermonum liber primus, secundus; Carminum liber primus, secundus; and Libellus iambicus super additus. As Renouard notes, the first book of Carmina was previously printed by the Aldus firm in 1491.
Of special note is the poem “Chrysopoeia” (k1r–k3v) on
the philosopher's stone, foreshadowing Augurello's major 1515 work of the same title on the transmutation of metals into gold.
The classic Aldine printer's device appears on the final page of this text.
Provenance: From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Adams A2152; Goldsmid, Aldine Press at Venice, 73; Renouard, Alde, 49.2; Index Aurel. *110.036; EDIT16 CNCE 3381; UCLA, Aldine Press: Catalogue of the Ahmanson-Murphy Collection (2001), 89. Period style medium brown calf, spine lettered in gilt, raised bands accented with blind fillets extending onto covers to terminate in trefoils; covers framed in blind with trefoils at forecorners, green silk ribbon bookmark present and all edges gilt. Light pencilling on endpapers; offsetting from previous binding to first and last few leaves.
A clean, lovely copy. (37603)
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