Le premier liure de La Premier Decade…des histoires depuis la ville fondée, traduit de Latin en Francois.
Paris, G. Corrozet 1548.
4to (220 x 130 mm.). [iv], 65 [r. 66], [4] leaves. FIFTEEN NARRATIVE TEXT WOODCUTS (including three repeats, some with letterpress in the image) all within a variety of four-block woodcut frames, woodcut of Lucretia in a single Mannerist woodcut frame of lions’ heads, foliage, etc., a woodcut Corrozet device in a four-block woodcut frame on the final verso, title in the single woodcut frame.
CONTEMPORARY FRENCH TAN CALF FOR MARCUS FUGGER (front hinge cracked and partly restored, rear panel slightly stained), outer and inner triple-rule frames, gilt corner fleurons, in the center of both panels is the gilt stamp of a hand with a branch on which sits a bird, spine gilt with a daisy in each compartment, Fugger’s librarian’s manuscript-lettered vellum spine label, brown edges.
With: Xenophon. c. 430-355/4 B.C.E.
La Cyropedie…Traduite de Græce en langue Françoyse par Iaques de Vintemille. Paris, [É. Groulleau for himself, J. Longis and] V. Sertenas 1547. 4to (223 x 160 mm.). [iix], 172 leaves. A fine series of elegant seven-line woodcut initials with thistle designs, Sertenas’ earliest woodcut device on the title.
Ad I-II: MARCUS FUGGER’S COPY OF TWO ANCIENT WORKS ON STATECRAFT AND POLITICS put into French by two translators of Machiavelli.
Both are in good condition (light browning, old adhesion causing loss of a few sorts to the last leaf of Xenophon and Livy’s title); ownership inscription of Marcus Fugger (1529-1597), stamp and library marks of his descendant, Count Ernst of Oettingen-Wallerstein (1594-1670); from the library of Jean Bourdel.
¶Karl & Faber, Bibliophile Kostbarkeiten a. d. Bibliothek d. Augsburger Patriziers Marcus Fugger (1933) 383 (this copy).
Ad I: First Edition of Jacques Gohory’s translation. Livy’s From the Founding of the City treats the legendary establishment and development of Rome: the arrival of Aeneas, the reigns of the seven kings and the beginning of the Republic. Gohory undertook the translation at the behest of Anne de Montmorency while simultaneously translating Machiavelli’s Discourses on the First Decade of Livy for his patron. Some of the woodcuts, including the Death of Lucretia, were cut for this edition. Two copies in American libraries.
¶Brun, Le Livre illustré en France au XVIe siècle 314; Bouchereaux, “Recherches bibliographiques sur Gilles Corrozet” in Bulletin du Bibliophile (1955) 275,51; Schweiger, Handbuch der classischen Bibliographie. Lateinische Schriftsteller I: 548 (l’Angelier issue); BP16 113235.
Ad II: First Edition of Jacques de Vintimille’s translation — the first into French. Xenophon’s Cyropedia tells the life of Persian King Cyrus the Great (c. 600-530 B.C.E.) and served as a manual for just rule. Vintimille translated it at the behest of François 1er, while also translating The Prince into French for Montmorency.
¶Marsh, “Xenophon” in Catalogus translationum VII: 84; Bunker, A Bibliographical Study of the Greek Works and Translations Published in France During the Renaissance: The Decade 1540-1550 221; Hoffmann, Bibliographisches Lexicon der gesammten Litteratur der Griechen III: 602; Mortimer, French 556 (Groulleau issue); BP16 112971.
Price: $18,000.00