Dante [Alighieri], .

DIVINA COMMEDIA]; [THE DIVINE COMEDY with the supposed commentary of Benvenuto da Imola]. (Incipit:) Qui comincia la vita e costumi dello excellente poeta vulgari Dante Alighieri di Firenze honore e gloria delidioma fiorentino.

      (Venice: Vindelinus de Spira, 1477) First edition with commentary of the Divine Comedy and the fifth overall and probably the earliest obtainable printing. Folio, antique, but later calf over boards, probably of the early 19th or very late period of the 18th century. The spine panel ruled and decorated in blind, lettered in blind. A pleasing copy, generously margined, this copy textually complete containing the complete COMMEDIA as printed as well as the additional Dante material, but without the preliminary introductory materials concerning the author, as is sometimes the case. Antique calligraphy to the lower foredge as would be typical in the Renaissance. VERY RARE AND OF THE GREATEST IMPORTANCE. First edition of the Divine Comedy with commentary and the fifth absolute. The present edition, printed by Vindelinus who also printed the Petrarca, shows his clear intention of publishing the great Italian authors and considering them at the same level as the traditional Latin ones. In fact, the text of the Divine Comedy is proposed together with Benvenuto's commentary, though in reality the author was Iacopo della Lana. At the end of the poem we also find the Credo, some poems of Busone da Gubbio, a sonnet, wrongly ascribed to Boccaccio by the tradition, and another sonnet having the function of colophon, ascribed to the editor Cristoforo Berardi da Pesaro. So this can be considered the first edition of Dante's great poem published with historical and didactic purpose. The gothic type used by Vindelinus bears witness to the reference of the printer to the manuscript tradition and to the printed tradition of religious works. It is interesting to note that, even as the adjective 'divine' would be utilized to define the poem in the edition of 1555 by Giolito, in the ordinary final sonnet the word appears referring to the poet himself ("inclito e divo Dante").