Camilli, Imprese illustri, Venice, 1586, contemporary limp vellum, Albani copy

CAMILLI, CAMILLO. Imprese illustri di diversi, coi discorsi di Camillo Camilli, et con le figure intagliate in rame di Girolamo Porro padovano, All' Ill.^mo et R.^mo Don Ferdinando Cardinal de' Medici. Parte prima (-Parte seconda; Parte terza). Venice: Francesco Ziletti, 1586

FIRST EDITION of Camilli's book of emblems for his contemporaries, arranged alphabetically by first name. From the Albani library.

4to (210 x 150 mm). Roman and italic type, 39 lines plus headline. Collation: a⁴ A-L⁸ M⁴ (last leaf blank); A-F⁸; A-C⁸ D⁴: 96+48+28 leaves. Engraved title-page for each part, 108 engraved illustrations by Porro, woodcut initials, head- and tailpieces.

Binding: Contemporary limp vellum (213 x 156 mm), manuscript lettering on spine, stubs from two pairs of ties. (Small areas of loss on spine.)

Provenance: old shelfmarks, G.XVIIII.19 and E.140.X — Albani family, of Urbino (probably Alessandro Albani, 1692-1779), eighteenth-century Bibliotheca Albana armorial stamp at foot of title-page with letters BA — [plausibly the copy listed in] Catalogo della copiosa biblioteca già appartenuta all'Eccellentissima Famiglia de' Principi Albani. Parte seconda, sale, Rome, Paolo Petrucci, 1858-1859, part LI, 25 January, no.90, price 50 lire. Acquisition: Purchased in 1990 from Ursus Rare Books, New York. References: Edit16 8702; Landwehr, Romanic Emblem Books 202; Mortimer, Harvard Italian 99