Liber, Antonius: Familiarium epistolarum compendium ex diversis auctoribus collectum.
[Cologne: Johann Koelhoff, the Elder, ca. 1482]
Fol. a-e8 f6 g-k8 L8 M10. [96] leaves (a1 blank).
L1 signed “Ii”, L2 “I2”, L3 “l3” and L4 “L4”.
BSB-Ink dates [ca. 1480?]
ISTC il00195950; GW M18129; Goff Add L195A; BMC I 223 (IB. 3507); CIBN L-162; BSB-Ink L-138.
The authors are listed on a2v as Marcus Tullius Cicero, Hieronymus (St. Jerome), Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, Bernardus Claravallensis (St. Bernard of Clairvaux), Antonius Beccadelli Panormita, Seneca, Guinifortus Barzizius, Gasparinus Barzizius, Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (Pope Pius II), Franciscus Philelphus, Sidonius Apollinaris, Thomas Aquinas, Poggius Florentinus, Leonardus Brunus Aretinus, and Phalaris. There are also model letters, a tract entitled ‘Magni oratoris Collucij veneti ad dominum Paulum de Cercaldo epistola ad studia liberalium artium exhortatoria’ (in fact, from Coluccio Salutati to Lodovico Alidosi), and letters between Antonius Liber and Rudolphus Langius (Rodolphus de Langen), Rodolphus Agricola and others - cf. ISTC.
| GIP number: | L22 |
| Shelf-mark: | Sp Coll Hunterian Bf.3.15 (see main library entry for this item) |
| Bound with: | The second of two incunabula bound together. Bound with: Pius II, Pont. Max., Epistolae familiares et in cardinalatu editae. [Louvain: Johann Veldener, 1477] (P54). |
| Provenance: | Unidentified Carthusian house: partially read inscription (under ultraviolet light) on a2r “[...] Carthus[...]”. Unidentified sale at Malines (Mechelen) in 1770 (so dated in N.R. Ker, 'William Hunter as a collector of medieval manuscripts' [1983], p. 15). William Hunter (1718-1783), physician and anatomist: purchased by Hunter as lot 4162 at the above sale through his agent, Pietro Molini, for 4 florins 15 sous according to Molini’s undated bill to Hunter; see University of Glasgow Library, Hunter Papers, H204. University of Glasgow: Hunterian bequest 1807; Hunterian Museum bookplate on front pastedown, with former shelfmark “Av.5.16”. |
| Binding: | 18th-century calf; covers decorated with a double gold-fillet border with fern-tip edge and with an acorn in gold at each inner corner; gold-tooled spine; marbled endpapers; red-edged leaves; green silk bookmark; first front flyleaf has watermark initials “G C” (or perhaps “C C”) and second front flyleaf has watermark initials “P I B”. Size: 290 x 214 mm. |
| Leaf size: | 280 x 204 mm. |
| Annotations: | Nota mark on M3r; loosely inserted at the front of the book are two sheets of paper containing notes in an 18th-century hand on a letter of Pius II to Charles VII of France. |
| Decoration: | On a2r a six-line initial “A” is supplied in blue with reserved white on a square ground of red pen-work which extends into the inner margin; other principal initials supplied with similar decoration (some with the colours reversed); smaller initials throughout supplied in alternate red and blue; capital strokes and paragraph marks supplied throughout in red; the same hand has decorated the first item in the volume. |
| Imperfections: | Wanting the blank leaf a1. |
