Patrizi, l sacro regno de'l gran Patritio, Venice, Sons of Aldo Manuzio, 1553, nineteenth-century boards

Patrizi, Francesco. Il sacro regno de'l gran Patritio, de'l vero reggimento, e de la vera felicità de'l principe, e beatitudine humana. Venice: Sons of Aldo Manuzio, 1553

Italian edition of Patrizi’s De regno, et regis institutione, a widely read treatise on the education of princes and good government based on secular history and in particular on Greek and Roman classics. The author (1413-1494), bishop of Gaetà and Governor of Foligno in Umbria, was a friend of Enea Silvio Piccolomini, Pope Pius II. The work initially circulated in manuscript with a dedication to Alfonso II of Aragon, Duke of Calabria (1448-1495), and eventually was printed at Paris by Galliot du Pré in May 1519.

8vo (152 x 98 mm). Italic and Roman type, 30 lines plus headline. collation: *⁸ **⁸ +++⁸ A-Z⁸ AA-ZZ⁸: 392 leaves. Woodcut Aldine device on title-page and final verso, woodcut historiated initials, instances of early marginalia. (Dampstaning, browning, and foxing.)

binding: Nineteenth-century paper-covered boards (165 x 112 mm), manuscript title on spine, top edge, and tail edge. (Minor soiling.)

provenance: Emilio Pittaluga, 20^th century ex libris — C.E. Rappaport, Rome, booksellers' ticket. acquisition: Purchased from C.E. Rappaport, Rome, 1988. references: UCLA 442; Renouard 155/2; Edit16 27185; USTC 847036