SEVERUS of Alexandria, Patriarch of Antioch.
De Ritibus Baptismi, et sacrĉ synaxis apud Syros Christianos receptis, liber.Antwerp, Christoffel Plantin, 1572.WITH: [WIDMANSTETTER (VON WIDMANSTADT), Johann Albrecht]. Syriacĉ Linguĉ Prima Elementa.Antwerp, Christoffel Plantin, 1572. 4to. 2 works in 1 volume. Christian prayers and baptismal rites in Syriac, with a different woodcut Golden Compasses publisher's device on each title-page and 1 (lovely) woodcut decorative initial letter. Both works set in Syriac types (serto for the main text with estrangela mostly for headings) with a Latin translation in a parallel column on the gutter side (in italic with headings in roman) and a Hebrew transliteration at the foot. Near contemporary (ca. 1598) limp sheepskin parchment.
- "132" [= 124]; (8), 23 pp. Adams S-1021 & S-1023/W-139 (9 & 7 copies); BMC STC Dutch, p. 187; Smitskamp, Philologia Orientalis 96; Voet 1120 & 2207 (6 & 5 copies). Two important contributions to the study of early Christianity as well as to Syriac linguistics and typography. The first work presents the baptismal rites practiced by Syriac-speaking Christians in the Middle East in the time of the author, Severus of Alexandria (ca. 465-ca. 540). He was Patriarch of Antioch from 1512 to 1518, and spent many years in Constantinople before and after. His works were banned and ordered to be burned in 536, so that only fragments survive.The present text comes from a manuscript sent to Plantin by his partner Daniel van Bomberghen (Bombergus) and edited by Guy Le Fèvre de la Boderie (1541-1598), who also edited the companion work, an introduction to the Syriac language with notes on the alphabet taken from Widmanstetter’s 1555 book of the same title, but the editor added a series of prayers also taken from a manuscript supplied by Van Bomberghen. The preliminaries of the Severus give detailed information on the origins of the publications, which grew out of Le Fèvre de la Boderie’s work on Plantin’s Polyglot Bible, published 1569-1572. They use the two Syriac types (serto and estrangela) that Robert Granjon cut in 1569 for the Polyglot, where they first appeared in 1570. The Elementa begins with a synopsis of the alphabet in both faces with the Hebrew and Latin equivalents and the names in all three scripts, information on the diacritical marks, etc. It no doubt helped to establish Granjon’s Syriacs as the standard form for many years.The endpapers provide a rare example of a sixteenth-century dated watermark: a one-handled pot, topped by a bunch of eleven grapes (arranged 1, 1, 3, 3, 3), the pot bearing the date "1598" and initials possibly "GG" (not in Briquet, but see his mark 12885). The book bears four owner’s inscriptions, the oldest "Ex libris Erasmi et Hammeri" probably referring to the Jena orientalist Christoph Hammer (1550-1597), the next (dated 1789) by the German/Danish orientalist theologian Friedrich Münter (1761-1830) and another by his son(?) dated 1831. In very good condition and with generous margins, with only a water stain at the head, mostly in the first two quires of the Severus. The preliminaries to the Elementa are bound before the Severus, with the rest following it. An important work of early Christianity in the Middle East, and of Syriac linguistics and typography.
[Bookseller: ASHER Rare Books]
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