Lomazzo, Trattato dell'arte della pittura, Milan, 1585, seventeenth-century French green morocco, Beckford copy

LOMAZZO, GIOVANNI PAOLO. Trattato dell'arte della pittura, scoltura, et architettura, di Gio. Paolo Lomazzo milanese pittore, diviso in sette libri. Ne' quali si discorre de la proportione de' moti. De' colori. De' lumi. De la prospettiva. De la prattica de la pittura. Et finalmente de le istorie d'essa pittura. Con una tavola de' nomi de tutti li pitttori [sic], scoltori, architetti, et matematici antichi, et moderni. Milan: Paolo Gottardo da Ponte for Pietro Tini, 1585

THE BECKFORD COPY. Lomazzo's treatise on painting first appeared in 1584; the text has been reissued here with a new title-page dated 1585. Although trained as an artist, Lomazzo went blind in 1571 so he redirected himself towards works about art and art criticism.

His treatise is often called the "Bible of Mannerism", as it attempted to provide a complete theoretical structure of painting, along with its companion volume, Idea del tempio della pittura. Lomazzo was acquainted with the Milanese painter Francesco Melzi, who owned Leonardo's notebooks.

This copy does not contain the additional bifolium with text to be added after chapter 16 in book six, which is sometimes bound at the end.

4to (210 x 148 mm). Roman and italic type, 40 lines plus headline. Collation: +⁸ ++¹² A-Vv⁸ Xx⁶: 370 leaves. Woodcut arms on title-page, woodcut initials, woodcut portrait of the author after Annibale Fontana on B1. (Small stain on Y1.)

Binding: Eighteenth-century green morocco gilt (219 x 161 mm), triple gilt fillet border with corner fleurons, spine gilt in compartments, red morocco lettering-piece, marbled edges. (Extremities rubbed, joints cracked, spine faded.)

Provenance: William Beckford (1760 -1844), Hamilton Palace sale, Sotheby's, 11 December 1882, lot 1861 — Sir Reginald Blomfield (architect, 1856-1942), pencil signature — sale, Sotheby's, 22 June 1989, lot 56 — Collation note by Bernard Breslauer on flyleaf dated 27 June 1989. Acquisition: Purchased in 1989 from Breslauer. References: Edit16 24454; Fowler 186