Details
SPRETUS, Desiderius (1414-ca. 1474). De Amplitudine, vastatione, instauratione urbis Ravennae. Edited by Jacobus Francus. Venice: Matteo Capcasa (di Codeca), 4 September 1489.
Super-chancery 4° (205 x 150 mm). Collation: a-c8 (a1r blank, a1v editor's dedication to Nicolas Foscari, a2r author's dedication to Jacobus Antonius Marcellus, patrician of Venice, a2v text, c8r colophon, c8v blank). 24 leaves. 38 lines. Type 1:82R. 7-, 4-, and 2-line initial spaces. (Dampstaining, closed tear to c3.) Later flexible vellum (endpapers renewed), green morocco folding case.
Provenance: 16th-century marginalia, including some emendations of the text and 2 passages in Greek on c4r and c6v (some cropped), a few corrections to transcriptions of monument inscriptions on c3v; Luis(?) de Alcala, later inscription on first blank page.
RARE EDITION OF ONE OF THE EARLIEST "GUIDEBOOKS" TO RAVENNA. The author surveys the early history of Ravenna and describes a few of the Byzantine churches and monuments, concluding with seven pages of transcriptions of carved monument inscriptions found throughout the city. The work was reprinted at least once in the 16th century (BM/STC listing a 1588 edition), and an Italian translation appeared in 1574. No other works are known by this author. Goff lists one copy in America, at the Walters Art Gallery. The printer Matteo Capcasa, a native of Parma, was active in Venice from 1485 though 1495. Capcasa was the first printer to receive the financial assistance of Lucantonio Giunta, for whom he printed three books of wider popular appeal immediately following this one (a Life of St. Jerome, an Imitatio Christi, both in Italian, and an Ovid).
With the Renaissance revival of interest in classical antiquity, a number of scholars and travellers compiled collections of Greek and Latin inscriptions (R. Weiss, The Renaissance Discovery of Classical Antiquity, 1979). Spreti's assemblage of Ravenna inscriptions was one of the first such collections to be printed; it long predates the first printed collection of inscriptions from Rome itself (Epigrammata antiquae urbis, Rome: J. Mazzochi, 1521). Spreti's work must also represent one of the earliest attempts to use typographical materials to represent the forms of ancient epigraphy. Curiously, he concentrates on Latin inscriptions, although Ravenna must have offered much similar material in Greek. Although Capcasa is said to have had a Greek type at his disposal thoughout his career (BMC), it was not employed for this book. Instead, a blank space was left on c6v, into which the Greek text of an epitaph from the church of St. Mammas was copied by hand; this is followed immediately by a printed Latin translation under the printed heading "Traductio suprascripti epitaphii". On c4r, the annotator used the margin to add the text of a Greek inscription found, according to his manuscript identification, "In aede diui Ioannis Evangelistae in pulpito".
HCR 14963; BMC V, 483 (IA. 22734); CIBN S-374; IGI 9139; Cicognara 4324; Goff S-688 (one copy only).
Super-chancery 4° (205 x 150 mm). Collation: a-c8 (a1r blank, a1v editor's dedication to Nicolas Foscari, a2r author's dedication to Jacobus Antonius Marcellus, patrician of Venice, a2v text, c8r colophon, c8v blank). 24 leaves. 38 lines. Type 1:82R. 7-, 4-, and 2-line initial spaces. (Dampstaining, closed tear to c3.) Later flexible vellum (endpapers renewed), green morocco folding case.
Provenance: 16th-century marginalia, including some emendations of the text and 2 passages in Greek on c4r and c6v (some cropped), a few corrections to transcriptions of monument inscriptions on c3v; Luis(?) de Alcala, later inscription on first blank page.
RARE EDITION OF ONE OF THE EARLIEST "GUIDEBOOKS" TO RAVENNA. The author surveys the early history of Ravenna and describes a few of the Byzantine churches and monuments, concluding with seven pages of transcriptions of carved monument inscriptions found throughout the city. The work was reprinted at least once in the 16th century (BM/STC listing a 1588 edition), and an Italian translation appeared in 1574. No other works are known by this author. Goff lists one copy in America, at the Walters Art Gallery. The printer Matteo Capcasa, a native of Parma, was active in Venice from 1485 though 1495. Capcasa was the first printer to receive the financial assistance of Lucantonio Giunta, for whom he printed three books of wider popular appeal immediately following this one (a Life of St. Jerome, an Imitatio Christi, both in Italian, and an Ovid).
With the Renaissance revival of interest in classical antiquity, a number of scholars and travellers compiled collections of Greek and Latin inscriptions (R. Weiss, The Renaissance Discovery of Classical Antiquity, 1979). Spreti's assemblage of Ravenna inscriptions was one of the first such collections to be printed; it long predates the first printed collection of inscriptions from Rome itself (Epigrammata antiquae urbis, Rome: J. Mazzochi, 1521). Spreti's work must also represent one of the earliest attempts to use typographical materials to represent the forms of ancient epigraphy. Curiously, he concentrates on Latin inscriptions, although Ravenna must have offered much similar material in Greek. Although Capcasa is said to have had a Greek type at his disposal thoughout his career (BMC), it was not employed for this book. Instead, a blank space was left on c6v, into which the Greek text of an epitaph from the church of St. Mammas was copied by hand; this is followed immediately by a printed Latin translation under the printed heading "Traductio suprascripti epitaphii". On c4r, the annotator used the margin to add the text of a Greek inscription found, according to his manuscript identification, "In aede diui Ioannis Evangelistae in pulpito".
HCR 14963; BMC V, 483 (IA. 22734); CIBN S-374; IGI 9139; Cicognara 4324; Goff S-688 (one copy only).