Thucydides, Historiae, Venice, Aldo Manuzio, 1502, Roman brown morocco by Niccolò Franzese

Thucydides. Thoukydidis. Thucydides [Greek]. Venice: Aldo Manuzio, May 1502

Editio princeps of the first and still most famous work in the Western historical tradition and the foundation of "scientific history," bound by Niccolò Franzese for Apollonio Filareto; later in the libraries of Cortlandt Field Bishop and Otto Schäfer.

Three groups of Filareto's bindings can be distinguished. This binding belongs to a group of eight done by Franzese and is the only one in folio format. Born in Reims under the French name of Nicolas Fery but living in Rome from about 1526 on, he was one of the most successful Roman binders of the period. The evolution of his style has been divided into three different phases: the present work belongs to the second group where the pattern of the design is still influenced by the French style of binding.

Apollonio Filareto exemplifies the Italian class of Secretaries, from Machiavelli to Gabriel Naudé, who acted as shadow advisors to Renaissance princes. Little is known about Filareto's life except that he belonged to the inner circle of the Farnese, whom he undoubtedly served "both zealously and efficiently" (G. D. Hobson, Maioli, p. 112). His fidelity to the Farnese is symbolized on his bindings (here on the lower cover) by the fleur-de-lys ornaments which, repeated six times, were their arms; the clasped hands signify "love, unity, concord, friendship, loyalty" (Maioli, p. 114). Filareto served in the 1530s as Secretary to the Farnese Pope Paul III, and in 1537 became chief advisor to his son, Pier Luigi—a man of evil fame whose corruption is well known through the Life of Benvenuto Cellini. He was created by his father duke of Parma and Piacenza where Filareto accompanied him. Because of his tyrannical rule, he was assassinated in September 1547. Filareto was subsequently tortured and imprisoned for three years. Disabused of ecclesiastical and dynastic politics, Alessandro Farnese gave him the parish of S. Sisto in Viterbo and he died there in 1569.

The use of an impresa as a personal emblem was very popular during the period, as were cameos and initials. Filareto's patron, Paul III, was a great lover of glyptic art. The device on the upper cover, an eagle flying over rocks, represents Filareto's fortune untouched by human contingencies and the device, "Este procul," is paraphrased from the Sybil's command to Aeneas's companions not to enter the underworld: "Procul o procul este profani" (Virgil, Aeneid, VI, 258).

The Bibliotheca Brookeriana Thucydides is one of seventeen Filareto bindings presently recorded, see Halwas; and six in private hands (the Petrarca was in 2024 with Bortolani). Two others from the Brooker library have recently been offered: Bembo, Epistolarum libri XVI (Lyon: Thibaud Payen, 1540) and Abravanel, Dialogi di amore (Venice: in the house of the sons of Aldo Manuzio, 1541). The other two are the 1535 Aldine Lactantius (last seen in the Esmerian sale, in 1972) and a now-empty binding by Marcantonio Guillery once housing the second part of the 1497 Aldine Iamblichus (last traced in the Wittock sale, in 2004). For the other Brooker examples, with further background on Filareto and his bindings, please see Bibliotheca Brookeriana: A Renaissance Library. Magnificent Books and Bindings, lot 10 (New York, 11 October 2023) and The Aldine Collection A–C, lot 92 (New York, 12 October 2023).

Chancery folio (294 x 194 mm.) Greek type, with some italic and Roman, 55 lines plus headline. collation: ^πΑA⁸ ΑA–ΞO⁸ ΟP⁴ (-ΟP4): 123 (of 124) leaves (lacking final blank ΟP4; with blank ^πΑA8). Four-, five, nine-, and twelve-line initial spaces with guide letters. (Dampstaining in upper fore-edge corner affecting text at beginning and end with fore-edge margins of quire ΟP repaired, tear in ΞO1 affecting text and repaired, small ink stain on fore-edge and margins of first six quires.)

binding: Roman brown morocco (296 x 202 mm) by Niccolò Franzese, ca. 1544, covers panelled gilt, floral corner tools, three borders formed by a single gilt fillet alternating with double blind fillets, roll-tooled arabesque outer border, inner border of interlocking rectangles, filled with three repeated floral tools, all within frames of blind fillets, front cover gilt- lettered at top THVCYDIDES GREC., gilt arabesque tools in center panel surrounding on the front cover a medallion with an eagle flying over a rocky shore and on the lower two fleurs-de-lys, the lettered mark of ownership APOL | LONII | PHILA | RETI. and a pair of clasped hands, spine in ten compartments with a single, small gilt floral tool in each, traces of four pairs of ties, gilt edges. (Dampstaining on upper fore-edge corners of the covers, mainly lower, two diagonal cuts on front cover, rebacked with original spine laid down, endpapers renewed using period paper, a bit of restoration to spine and extremities.) Half brown morocco folding-case.

provenance: Apollonio Filareto (ca. 1505–1569), supralibros impresa — unidentified owner, seventeenth-century inscription "Fr. Dom(ini)cus Rubeus Bonon(ien)sis" on title-page [read as Frater Domenicus Rubens in Cortlandt Bishop sale catalogue] — unidentified owner, eighteenth-century inscription "Sauterive (or Dauterive?)" [as Dauterive in Cortlandt Bishop sale catalogue] — Louis-Alexandre Barbet (1850–1931); Henri Baudoin, Maurice Ader & Librairie Giraud-Badin, Paris, Catalogue de la Bibliothèque de feu M. L.-A. Barbet. Première partie, Paris, 13–14 June 1932, lot 148; purchased by — unidentified owner (FF 26,100) — Cortlandt Field Bishop (1870–1935) — Shirley Douglas Falcke (1889–1957); Kende Galleries at Gimbel Brothers, New York, The Magnificent French Library formed by the late Cortlandt F. Bishop; the property of Mr. and Mrs. Shirley Falcke, 7–8 December 1948, lot 316; purchased by — unidentified owner ($290) — Albert-Louis Natural (1918–2002) — Librairie Quentin, Molènes, Geneva; Catalogue 7 (Geneva, 1985), item 99 (CHF 56,000) — Otto Schäfer (1912–2000), acquired in 1985 (OS 1314) — Otto-Schäfer-Stiftung e.V., Schweinfurt; Sotheby's New York, The Collection of Otto Schäfer. Part I: Italian Books, 8 December 1994, lot 181 ($57,500). acquisition: Purchased at Sotheby's via Martin Breslauer, Inc. references: UCLA 57; Adams T662; Aldo Manuzio tipografa 60; Edit16 55824; Renouard 33/4; USTC 859004; for the binding: Manfred von Arnim, Europäische Einbandkunst aus sechs Jahrhunderten 30; De Marinis, La Legatura artistica in Italia nei secoli XV e XVI, no. 825 and pl. 132 ; A. Hobson, Apollo and Pegasus, no. 8; G. D. Hobson, Maioli, Canevari and Others, pp. 112–119