Tacitus, Opera, Florence, Heirs of Filippo I Giunta, 1527, contemporary russet Florentine calf

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius. P. Cornelii Taciti Ab execessu diui Augusti Historiarum libri quinque nuper inuenti atque cum reliquis eius operibus maxima diligentia excusi. Florence: Heirs of Filippo I Giunta, 22 May 1527

Handsomely bound in contemporary Florentine russet calf. The text is based on a manuscript containing the newly discovered Annales I-VI, brought from Germany to Rome, ca 1508, where it was edited by Filippo Beroaldo the younger, and printed in 1515. In this second edition, Beroaldo’s letter to Leo X is reprinted, and there is a new epistle addressed to students by Antonio Francini of Montevarchi (Varchiensis), a translator and corrector for the Giunta press.

8vo (164 x 102 mm, a few leaves short). Italic type, 30 lines plus headline. collation: A-Z⁸ AA-YY⁸ Z⁴: 380 leaves. Printer's device to title-page and verso of last leaf. (Title-page loosening and somewhat toned, intermittent foxing, repair to closed tear on last leaf.)

binding: Contemporary russet Florentine calf (171 x 108 mm), multiple blind fillets around sides and inside forming a frame containing a repeated blind floral tool, further inside a rectangle with three blind fillets containing a repeated stirrup tool; large gilt fleurons at inner angles and a gilt arabesque lozenge in center, traces of two pairs of fabric ties, triple blind fillets on turn-ins, spine with three double bands, compartments with a saltire. (A couple of small wormholes to spine, spine a little darkened and cracked, corners bumped.)

provenance: Unidentified owner, at top of lower pastedown contemporary inscriptions ".3ii." and "Appio Pulcro," likely an early price — unidentified owner, monogram "I.S.π" below printer's device on last leaf and again under colophon, likely the same annotator who added extensive marginalia, particularly on Germanic history, including drawings of the flooding of the Tiber, the statue of Augustus, the Temple of Fortune, the Arch of Germanicus, and the vision of eight eagles before the Battle of Idistaviso — unidentified owner, extensive contemporary marginalia especially in first fifth of text; nine lines of text (apparently failed to appear in print) in contemporary hand at very end of text above colophon — Sokol Books Ltd; Catalogue 73 (London [2018?]), item 73. acquisition: Purchased from Sokol Books, 2022. references: Renouard LI/94; Decia & Delfiol p. 133 no. 203; Edit16 28789 (Variant B: "Diversa composizione tipografica del primo fascicolo", with reading on title "Execssv" (not "Excessv"))