Object details
Accession number
2.b.1.5
Creators
Full title
Defensio ad Corelium.
Creation Date
13 September 1474
Object Case
Dante Case
Language
Latin
Publication Place
Venice
Binding Description
18th-century neo-classical red morocco, with three fillets and urns, Greek keys and 'Calderini in Martiale Ven: De Ru. 1474' tooled in gold on the covers and spine respectively; marbled pastedowns and gilt edges.
Description
[172] leaves (leaves [1] and [172] blank) ; 28.1 cm. (fol.)
Provenance
Collection of Maffeo Pinelli (1736-1785), hereditary director of the official Venetian press and book collector. No. 6383 in the six-volume catalogue of his library compiled in 1787 by Jacopo Morelli (1754-1819), keeper of the Biblioteca Marciana, Venice.
In 1787-?88 James Edwards of Halifax (1756-1816), English book collector and bookseller, purchased Pinelli's entire library in Venice for around £7000. Edwards and his associate James Robson sold the Pinelli library in London in two sales in 1789 and 1790. This volume was lot 11285 in the first sale, where it went unsold and lots in the 1790 sale....
Purchased by Michael Wodhull (1740-816), English poet, translator of Euripides and book collector, for £12 6s 6d on April 24th, 1793. Wodhull's books passed first to his sister, Mary Ingram, from her to Samuel Amy Severne and then to John Edmund Severne (b. 1826), who auctioned the collection at Sotheby’s in 1886.
Purchased by the London bookseller William Ridler (active 1877-1914) at the Wodhull sale, Sotheby's, 11-21 January 1886, lot 566 for £2 11s [price according to Princeton University Library annotated copy of catalogue].
Entered Isabella Stewart Gardner's collection before 1906. CHECK annotated Choice of Books catalogues in Archives.
Marks
Watermarks (e.g. first leaf): [to be identified.]
Inscribed in pen (recto of upper free endpaper): [?] a/2/o [a seller's price-code]
Inscribed in pencil (verso of upper free endpaper): N.4.12 [?17th-century library pressmark]
Inscribed in pencil (verso of upper free endpaper): £3.8.0 / TsT [sterling retail price and price code possibly based on the word "taxidermis" of bookseller William Ridler]
Inscribed in pen (recto of front fly-leaf): Edwards [James Edwards of Halifax, 1757-1816; possibly written by Wodhull below]
Inscribed in pen (recto of front fly-leaf): l s d / 12.12.6 / M. Wodhull / Apr. 24th1793. [Michael Wodhull, 1740-1816]
Affixed excerpt from an unidentified sale catalogue: Calderini (Domiti) Commentarii in M. Valerium Martialem, cum Defensione, Venet. Jac. de Rubeis. MCCCCLXXVIIII.- Calderini Com[m]e[n]tarioli i[n] Ibin Ovidii, 5l 5s. sine loco aut anno. These are very desirable specimens of early typography. There are rough leaves throughout, and they are in the original oak covers. The last piece is certainly the production of the same printer, and about the same date, though apparently not published with it, s the date, &tc. is affixed to the former piece only; and besides that, the lines are full one-third of an inch wider in the latter than in the former. Some Account of the labours of Calderinus will be found in Roscoe's Loreno de Medici, Vol. II, p. 92, to whom this book is dedicated.
Inscribed in pen (recto of front fly-leaf): Bib. Instruct. No. 2813 ejusdem anni & oppidi sed sub diversi Typographa nomine et editio [?]prorsus diversa. [written by Michael Wodhull, 1740-1816]
Inscribed in pen (recto of front fly-leaf): Bib. Pinelli No. 6383. [1787 Morelli library catalogue number] [written by Michael Wodhull, 1740-1816]
Inscribed in pen (recto of front fly-leaf): See Panzer: V. 2 p. 105 no. 169 [written by Michael Wodhull, 1740-1816]
Inscribed in pen (recto of front fly-leaf): Collat & complet. with the detached 14 leaves after the [?]date of comment on Ovid's Ibn sd stated in [?]Laire Index Libri (card. Lonenti). VI: p: 332, no 15. [written by Michael Wodhull, 1740-1816]
Marginalia in Latin in an 15th or early 16th-century hand throughout but washed out.
Inscribed in pen (recto of first back fly-leaf): 12 / £127
Inscribed in pen (recto of first back fly-leaf): July 8th 1806
Dimensions
28.1 x 20.9 cm (11 1/16 x 8 1/4 in.)
Display Media
Ink on paper
Web Commentary
The Roman poet Marcus Valerius Martialis, 40-104 AD, was famous for his witty and graphic epigrams--short verses which captured a wide variety of his fellow Romans. Calderino's Renaissance commentary gave his audience a social and political background for Martial's poetry. This is its second edition (dated September 13) appearing only six months after the first edition.
Its familiar Roman typeface is characteristic of the humanists' editions of the classics. They preferred it to the Gothic typeface, used for religious and other texts, because it look like the script of many classical manuscripts. Actually, its origin is in the Carolingian minuscule, a writing style developed under the rule of Charlemagne when many classical texts were preserved in monastic libraries.
Permanent Gallery Location
Long Gallery
Bibliography
Jacopo Morelli. Bibliotheca Maphaei Pinellii Veneti, 6 vols (Venice, 1787), III, p. 124, no. 6383.
James Edwards. Bibliotheca Pinelliana: A Catalogue of the Magnificent and Celebrated library of Maffei Pinelli, late of Venice...(London, 2-28 March, 20 April-2 June 1789), p. 459, lot 11286.
James Edwards. Bibliotheca Pinelliana: Appendix...(London, 1 February-9 March 1790), p. ?, lot ? CHECK online at Harvard.
Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge. Catalogue of the Extensive & Valuable Library Collected at the End of the Last and Beginning of the Present Century by Michael Wodhull ... the property of J.E. Severne ... (London, 11-21 January), p. 46, lot 566.
Isabella Stewart Gardner. A Choice of Books from the Library of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Fenway Court (Boston, 1906), p. 14. (as "The last twenty-seven pages are "sine loco aut anno"")
Isabella Stewart Gardner. A Choice of Manuscripts and Bookbindings from the Library of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Fenway Court (Boston, 1922), p. 76. (Italian binding)
Rebecca Karo. Short-Title Catalogue of Highlights from the Book Collection in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Unpublished manuscript. (Boston, 1970s), no. 1.
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