NANI MIRABELLI, DOMINICUS

Polyanthea, hoc est, opvs svavissimis floribvs celebriorvm sententiarvm tam Graecarvm qvam Latinarvm exornatvm, qvos ex innvmeris fere cvm sacris, tum prophanis authoribus, iisque vetustioribus & recentioribus, summa fide collegere! Dominicus Nan

      Lugduni [i.e. Lyons], 1600. Folio, pp. [12], 851; woodcut device on title-p., title printed in red and black, a few woodcut initials and ornaments; slight inkstain enters the first few leaves in the fore-margin, title a little soiled, the whole lightly toned and/or foxed, old library rubberstamps in the margin of the title and on the last leaf of text; bound in ca. 1720 full tan goatskin, edges rubbed and worn, a few small cracks starting, but a good, sound copy of a most handsome French prize binding, with gilt arms central, surrounded by a seme of fleurs-de-lys, spine gilt in compartments with a smaller seme of fleurs-de-lys; both covers with the gilt arms, probably that of the Baron du Mesnil-Garnier, presumably the patron of the Musarum Cadomensium in Regio Collegio Societatis Jesu Agonothetae, with a tipped in presentation leaf in front of the title, with spaces for the name and date left blank. The binding is perhaps one of several made for a prize presentation, but it seems obvious it was never used as such. That said, an inscription on a rear flyleaf shows that the book was given to Carolo Caesari Blaird for "singularis diligenticae praemium! in schola humanitatis auditori, and is signed and dated Joannes d'Herouville, Humaniorum litterarium professor in Collegio Marchiano, anno 1720." The Polyanthea is one of the earliest "Konversationlexica," an encyclopaedial work arranged in alphabetical order and covering subjects in the fields of classical antiquity, medieval history, natural history and medicine; also a wealth of anecdotes, adagia and quotations from better than 200 authorities, including Dante, Petrarch, and others. Says Collison in his Encyclopedias: Their History throughout the Ages: "In some ways [the Polyanthea] may be said to have been the prototype of the Conversationslexicon: it is arranged alphabetically by subjects, and it is furnished with etymological derivations, complete with numerous illustrative quotations." Nanus Mirabellius was a poet, physician and jurist who did much to promote the study of the ancients. The work appeared in a number of editions throughout the 16th and into the 17th century. It was first published in Savona, 1503 and it ran to 26 editions up to 1681. This edition not in Adams; BM French STC, p. 322; only 1 copy in Ireland listed in OCLC.