Pliny the elder 23 79 a d (2 risultati)

Hardcover. Condizione: Fine. 1st Edition. Bound in contemporary English calfskin, ruled in blind, re-backed and re-cornered in morocco. An excellent copy internally with very minor faults. A few signatures have very marginal damp-stains, there are occasional rust spots, minor marginal tears, and a few natural paper flaws (no loss to text.) The first title page features an elaborate architectural border with Solomonic columns. "The 'Natural History' of Pliny the Elder is more than a natural history: it is an encyclopaedia of all the knowledge of the ancient world. It comprises 37 books with mathematics and physics, geography and astronomy, medicine and zoology, anthropology and physiology, philosophy and history, agriculture and mineralogy, the arts and letters. The 'Historia' soon became a standard book of reference; abstracts and abridgements appeared by the third century. Bede owned a copy, Alcuin sent the early books to Charlemagne, and Dicuil, the Irish geographer, quotes him in the ninth century. It was the basis of Isidore's Etymologiae and such medieval encyclopedias as the Speculum Majus of Vincent of Beauvais and the Catholicon of Balbus. One of the earliest books to be printed at Venice, the centre from which so much of classical literature was first dispensed, it was later translated into English by Philemon Holland in 1601, and twice reprinted (a notable achievement for so vast a text). Over and over again it will be found that the source of some ancient piece of knowledge is Pliny." (PMM 5) "Holland's first book, the first complete rendering of Livy into English, was published in 1600 when he was nearly fifty. It was a work of great importance, presented in a grand folio volume of 1458 pages, and dedicated to the queen. . "The Livy was followed in the next year by an equally huge translation, of the elder Pliny: The Historie of the World, Commonly called, the Naturall Historie. This encyclopaedia of ancient knowledge about the natural world had already had a great indirect influence in England, as elsewhere in Europe, but had not been translated into English before, and would not be again for 250 years."(ODNB). FIRST EDITION, second issue with cancel title page.…

Condizione: Good. PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS: Original early sixteenth-century printed leaf from an edition of Pliny the Elder's Natural History, dated 1531. Leaf measures approximately 8½ × 13 inches. Printed in Latin with two columns of Renaissance typography. The leaf includes a large decorative ornamental device beneath the text, characteristic of Renaissance printing design. The elaborate engraved decoration features intricate architectural and foliate elements. The leaf is accompanied by a facsimile reproduction of the original title page from the volume in which the leaf appeared, providing bibliographic context. CONDITION: The original leaf is in good condition with Light overall toning consistent with age. Small loss at the upper left corner. Faint vertical fold. Minor edge wear. Printing remains clear and legible, with the decorative device intact. Small staple [?] holes near the upper edge, likely related to previous mounting or display. HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE: PLINY'S NATURAL HISTORY AND RENAISSANCE PRINTING. Pliny the Elder's Natural History, written in the first century AD, stands among the most important surviving works of Roman scholarship, an ambitious attempt to gather the known knowledge of the ancient world into a single encyclopedia. Renaissance printing of classical authors such as Pliny played a crucial role in recovering and disseminating ancient learning, transforming texts once largely confined to manuscript circulation into works available across Europe's expanding intellectual networks. This leaf is a surviving fragment of that transmission, connecting ancient Roman knowledge with early modern readers. SUBJECTS: Pliny the Elder, Natural History, Renaissance Printing, Sixteenth-Century Books, Classical Scholarship, History of Science, Early Printed Leaves, Early Printing, Classical Literature, Historical Documents, Book Arts.…