Ficino, De vita libri tres, Lyon, 1560, contemporary brown morocco for Marcus Fugger, with gilt medallion stamp of Julius Caesar

FICINO, MARSILIO. De vita libri tres, Recens iam a mendis situq[ue] vindicati, ac summa castigati, diligentia, quorum: Primus, De studiosorum sanitate tuenda. Secundus, de vita producenda. Tertius, de vita coelitus comparanda. Lyon: Guillaume Rouillé, 1560

A FINE EXAMPLE OF A BINDING FEATURING A MEDALLION PORTRAIT OF JULIUS CAESAR BOUND FOR MARCUS FUGGER (1529–1597), scion of the powerful banking family and trading family based in Augsburg (see also lots 1587, 1606, 1693 and 1828). Hobson's census includes seven books acquired by Fugger with plaquettes of Caesar, Nero, Judith, and a male mask, including the present volume and one in the Henry Davis Collection at the British Library (Foot, III, no. 224). Each is a small-format volume, printed in Lyon between 1552 and 1560. Plaquette ornaments were introduced by Paduan antiquaries, as a style of binding appropriate for humanistic works. The covers were impressed with an intaglio stamp, resulting in an impression in relief. The metallic prototype for the portrait of Julius Caesar adorning this binding has yet to be identified. Incuse matrices which possibly were used by binders survive in the British Museum, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, and Museo Nazionale di Ravenna (Jeremy Warren, Catalogue of the Collection in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford: Medieval and Renaissance sculpture, volume 3: Plaquettes (Oxford 2014), nos. 357-358). Hobson recorded twenty-three bindings decorated by the plaquette, produced in at least five towns, covering books printed between 1477 and 1558. He lists the present binding, but was unaware of its location.

The earliest of these bindings appeared on presentation or special bindings, but their commercial use grew over time. For other plaquette bindings in the sale, see lots 1643, 1644, 1652, 1680, 1731, 1768, 1823, and 1832. Ficino's spiritual work comprises three sections, on healthy living, on long life, and on obtaining a life in accord with the heavens, the last of which drew negative attention from the Church authorities for containing heretical themes.