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OVIDIUS NASO, PUBLIUS : OVIDIO ISTORICO, POLITICO, MORALE Brevemente spiegato, e delineato con artificiose figure. Consagrato al celebre pittore patrone mio collendisimo GIUSEPPI NASINI

Girolamo Albrizzi, Venice, 1696

8vo., full crushed brown 19th century morocco with plain sides. Spine with five raised bands and gilt titling.Albrizzi, the publisher, has used a number of the wood blocks from the Giolito editions of Ovid's Le Trasformationi [1553 and afterwards]. In the present edition, there are a total of 73 images measuring approximately 2 1/2 x 3 1/2 inches, almost all of which, according to Ruth Mortimer, "...were designed for this [1553] edition." The history of the blocks is complicated, but according to Mortimer, "Henkel notes recurrence of the Giolito blocks as late as 1688."With the exception of Fables 1, 2, 3, 4, 16, 33 and 39 (which are offered in combination with other Fables), each of the 73 other Fables is printed in italic type one to a page, beneath one of the woodcuts. Below that, under the heading, ALLEGORIA, is a paragraph printed in roman type. The layout and (of course) the illustrations, in fact the very "feel" of the book, is entirely appropriate for the middle of the 15th century. It is altogether anachronistic. Girolamo Albrizzi, the publisher, is responsible for a number of important books, including: L'Originie del Danubo [1685]; Vincenzo Coronelli's Atlante veneto [1695], and Alessandro Locatelli's Racconto historico della Veneta guerra in Levante [1691]. A most CURIOUS AND HIGHLY APPEALING edition of Ovid. For a complete discussion of the blocks and of Harvard's fine Ovid holdings, see: Mortimer/Italian 342.

A 17TH CENTURY OVID WITH 16TH CENTURY WOODCUTS

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