CAESAR, Caius Julius.

Commentarii.

      [Edited by Petrus Justinus Philelphus. With Raymondus Marlianus, Index locorum in commentariis Caesaris de bello Gallico descriptorum.] Milan, Philippus de Lavagnia, 8 April 1478 Folio (326 × 234 mm). 151 leaves (of 152), medial blank fol. 132 (sig. r6) present as a stub only, as often. Collates: a–p8 q6 r6 A8 B8 C4. 42 lines to a page. Nineteenth-century vellum over thin pasteboards, bookplate of William Horatio Crawford on front pastedown endpaper. Large penwork initials and capital strokes in red throughout, contemporary ownership inscription on last leaf verso. Quaritch pencilled collation mark on rear inside cover, dated 10 Jan 1968. Some minor marginal finger-soiling in margins, an excellent copy, unwashed, the paper fresh and strong. A handsome early incunable edition of the Commentaries of Caesar, the fifth overall, with contemporary rubrication. The text comprises the seven books of the Gallic War with the continuation by Caesar’s friend Aulus Hirtius, together with the six books on the Civil Wars attributed to various authors. Added in this edition is the geographical index by the Milanese scholar Raymondo Marliano which had first appeared the previous year in the first edition printed at Milan, by Antonio Zaroto. The editio princeps was printed by Sweynheym and Pannartz at Rome in 1469.The inscription in Latin written on the last leaf verso in a fine lettre bâtarde reads in translation, “This book was bought by Lord Henry Keddekij[?] the twenty-seventh abbot of the church of the Blessed Mary for [?] All Saints Chapel in the year 1480 AD. This book belongs to the church of the Blessed Mary in [?] All Saints Chapel of the Cistercian Order in the Diocese of Tournai in Flanders”. This contemporary provenance places this copy close to the University of Louvain, where the compiler of the geographical index Marliano taught classics from 1461 to 1475, one of an unbroken sequence of notable Italian lecturers there.From the library of William Horatio Crawford (1815–1888), the notable Irish collector of books, works of art and rare plants. Crawford, a reserved and dignified man of “ascetic temperament”, inherited from his father Lakelands, an old house overlooking Cork Harbour “richly stored with rare books, paintings and engravings” and with a fine arboretum. He funded the building of the magnificent 1884 extension to the Cork customs house which now houses the Crawford Municipal Art Gallery, and part-funded the astronomical observatory at University College Cork which also bears his name. De Ricci (p. 165) refers to his “great library of manuscripts, incunabula and other rare volumes”. His estate sale, sold by Sotheby’s over 12 days beginning in March 1891, realised £21,255. Hain 4216; Proctor 5861; GW 5867; BMC VI 706 (IB 26152); Goff C-20.