Guevara, Libro primo (-secondo) delle lettere, Venice, 1547, Venetian gilt binding by the Cicero Binder for Cardinal Perrenot de Granvelle

Two volumes, 8vo (162 x 98 mm). Roman and italic types, 30 lines plus headline. collation: A⁸ A–Z⁸ Aa–Ee⁸ Ff⁴; A⁴ A–Z⁸ Aa–Ii⁸ K⁴: 500 leaves. Woodcut printer’s device on titles, woodcut initials.

binding: Contemporary Venetian morocco (167 x 106 mm) by the Cicero Binder, for Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle (Piquard/Brooker Type C), with open frame formed by 2 fillets and multiple blind fillets, inner fillet with excedrae, small gilt fleuron at inside corners, shaped cartouche in centre formed by a gilt fillet with large fleurons finials at top and bottom and smaller ones and sides and 4 inner points, lettered in cartouche on upper cover “L L I [II] DEL GUEVARA”, traces of 2 silk ties, spines tooled blind in compartments with 3 full and 4 half bands, fitted folding case. (Minor wear to spine ends.)

provenance: Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle (1517-1586), binding—Maurice Burrus (1882-1959), his acquisition label "Lauria, 1935" (since removed)—Ader Picard Tajan & Claude Guérin, Reliures et livres anciens, Paris, 15 November 1971, lot 73—Jean Fürstenberg (1890-1982), booklabel (since removed)—Martin Breslauer Inc., New York, Catalogue 107 (1984), item 165 ("With bookplates of Maurice Burrus and 'Ex Museo Hans Fürstenberg'")—Librairie Lardanchet, Paris (1989), item 113; Paris (1993), item 118. acquisition: Purchased in 1993 from Librairie Lardanchet, Paris. references: (1) Edit16 CNCE 22166; USTC 835205; (2) Edit16 CNCE 22161; USTC 835198; Anthony Hobson, Renaissance book collecting (Cambridge 1999), "Appendix 7: Bindings by the Cicero Binder", no. 19