Bembo, Prose, Venice, 1525, contemporary blind-stamped calf
Bembo, Pietro
Estimate
1,000 - 1,500 GBP
Lot Details
Description
BEMBO, PIETRO. Prose, ne quali si ragiona della Volgar Lingua scritte al Cardinale de Medici che poi è stato creato a sommo Pontifice et detto Papa Clemente Settimo divise in Tre Libri. Venice: for Giovanni Tacuino, September 1525
TRUE FIRST EDITION of Pietro Bembo's influential treatise, which provides a codification of the Tuscan vernacular as a literary language, IN A CONTEMPORARY BINDING.
Castellani Pollidori surveys 23 copies of the supposed first edition, of which 18 have a handwritten correction of "altre" to "arte" on G6r (as with the present copy), whereas 5 copies have a typographic correction. His article concludes that the copies with the handwritten correction are genuine first editions, whereas those with the typographic correction are in fact pirated copies.
Chancery folio (306 x 212 mm). Roman type, 35 lines plus headline. collation: A-Q6: 96 leaves. Manuscript correction of "altre" to "arte" on G6r, endleaves with pen-trials in an early modern hand. (Some soiling and marginal dampstaining, small tears to I2-5 affecting a few letters, closed tear at lower margin of L3 just touching text.)
binding: Contemporary blind-stamped calf (314 x 218 mm), plausibly Roman, tooled in blind, covers with double rectangular outer border enclosing two square compartments containing a lozenge-shaped device and four fleurons, spine with raised bands in four compartments, manuscript label to second compartment lettered "Prose del Bẽ". (Spine slightly worn and repaired at head, upper hinge cracked.)
provenance: Pasquino Bencenni, partially erased early modern ownership inscription to upper endpaper—John Sparrow (1906-1992), academic, barrister, bibliophile, and Warden of All Souls College, Oxford—sale, Christie's, 22 October 1992, lot 7. acquisition: Purchased at the preceding sale. references: Edit16 CNCE 4997; Ornella Castellani Pollidori, "Sulla data di pubblicazione delle 'Prose della Volgar Lingua'", Archivio Glottologico italiano, vol.61, 1976, pp.101-7
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