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Details
DANTE Alighieri (1265-1321). La Commedia. Commentary by Cristoforo Landino; edited by Piero da Figino. Venice: Petrus de Plasiis, Cremonensis, 18 November 1491.
Fourth illustrated edition of the Divine Comedy, with 100 charming woodcuts. Goff D-33.
Chancery folio (304 x 210mm). 100 woodcuts, woodcut white-vine initials from several sets, initial spaces (a4-7 supplied from another copy and repaired, p1 to end with stain at inner margin with small loss in text from q1 onwards). Later vellum with initials A.M. surrounding a stork in gilt on upper cover, title label on spine and manuscript title on lower fore-edge; Italian export seal issued by the Biblioteca Nazionale in Rome. Provenance: few early annotations — Rappaport, Rome (bookseller’s ticket) — Count Alessandro Magnaguti, Mantua (1887-1966; binding and bookplate dated 1924).
All early illustrations for the Divine Comedy derive from those made by Botticelli, 19 of whose designs were engraved for the 1481 Florentine edition. The cuts used by Plasiis are very similar in design, character and quality to those used by Benalis and Capcasa in March of the same year, and they have been considered copies of that earlier edition. There are small differences in composition between the two sets, however, and Plasiis's cuts are larger, measuring 83 x 85mm. Rather than one being copied from the other, Hind suggests that, given the short interval of time between the two editions, the cuts were made by the same workshop which supplied each printer with his own set. HCR 5950; GW 7970; BMC V 270; Bod.-inc. D-016; BSB-Ink D-10; Essling 532; Sander 2314; Hind II 484; Goff D-33.
Fourth illustrated edition of the Divine Comedy, with 100 charming woodcuts. Goff D-33.
Chancery folio (304 x 210mm). 100 woodcuts, woodcut white-vine initials from several sets, initial spaces (a4-7 supplied from another copy and repaired, p1 to end with stain at inner margin with small loss in text from q1 onwards). Later vellum with initials A.M. surrounding a stork in gilt on upper cover, title label on spine and manuscript title on lower fore-edge; Italian export seal issued by the Biblioteca Nazionale in Rome. Provenance: few early annotations — Rappaport, Rome (bookseller’s ticket) — Count Alessandro Magnaguti, Mantua (1887-1966; binding and bookplate dated 1924).
All early illustrations for the Divine Comedy derive from those made by Botticelli, 19 of whose designs were engraved for the 1481 Florentine edition. The cuts used by Plasiis are very similar in design, character and quality to those used by Benalis and Capcasa in March of the same year, and they have been considered copies of that earlier edition. There are small differences in composition between the two sets, however, and Plasiis's cuts are larger, measuring 83 x 85mm. Rather than one being copied from the other, Hind suggests that, given the short interval of time between the two editions, the cuts were made by the same workshop which supplied each printer with his own set. HCR 5950; GW 7970; BMC V 270; Bod.-inc. D-016; BSB-Ink D-10; Essling 532; Sander 2314; Hind II 484; Goff D-33.
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