Plutarchus: Vitae illustrium virorum. [Latin]

Edited by Johannes Antonius Campanus.   Add:  Festus Rufus:  De historia Romana.

[Strassburg: The 'R-Printer' (Johann Mentelin & Adolf Rusch), ca. 1473-75]
Fol.  Part I: [1¹² 2¹⁰ 3⁸ 4-13¹⁰ 14⁸ 15-26¹⁰ 27⁸ 28¹⁰].  [276] leaves (the first and last blank).  Part II: [1¹⁰ 2¹⁰ (2/4+1, 2/6+1) 3-12¹⁰ 13⁶ 14-24¹⁰].  [238] leaves.
ISTC ip00831000; GW M34477; Goff P831; BMC I 62 (IC. 647); Bod-inc P-391; CIBN P-490; BSB-Ink P-625.

Dated ca. 1473-75 by P. Needham (Christie's, Doheny 16, Sotheby's Schøyen 6), who prefers to see Mentelin in association with Rusch as responsible for the work of the R-printer.   ISTC dates after 1470-71 and identifies the ‘R-Printer’ solely as Adolf Rusch.

GIP number:	P76
Shelf-mark:	Sp Coll Hunterian Cm.1.4 (see main library entry for this item)
Provenance:	Frater Paulus de Muntzdail (d.1487), Doctor of Canon Law, provost of the church of Saint Mary in Flanheim, rector of the parish church in Kreuznach near Mainz, entered the Carthusian monastery of S. Albanus near Trier:  inscription on 1/1r of part I ‘Frater paul[us] de Mu[n]tzdail cu[m] h[uius] dom[us] s[an]c[t]i Albani iux[ta] Treue[ri]m ord[in]is Carthu[siensis] adhuc esset noviti[us] et ita lib[er]rim[us] de q[ui]b[us]cu[m]q[ue] r[e]b[us] suis p[ro] o[mn]i volu[n]tate sua dispone[re] donauit hu[n]c et si[n]gulos libros suos ad p[er]petuu[m] co[mmun]e[m] vsu[m] [con]ue[n]t[us] h[uius] dom[us] s[an]c[t]i Albani s[ine] o[mn]i exceptio[n]e ... In isto volu[m]i[n]e [con]tinet[ur] Plutarchus de viris illustribus’. Trier, North Rhine-Westphalia, Carthusians, S. Albanus:  see above. Edward Harley (1689-1741), Lord Harley; from 1724 2nd Earl of Oxford:  see below. Thomas Osborne (d.1767), bookseller:  top corner of front free endpaper cut off - as in many other Harleian volumes; revised price in pencil ‘3=3=0’ adjacent to excision; perhaps no. 881 ‘Plutarchi Liber de viris clariss. ... Edit. Antiq. sine Loco aut Anno’ in Osborne’s 'Catalogus bibliothecae Harleianae', III (1744). William Hunter (1718-1783), physician and anatomist:  source unknown. Hunterian bequest 1807.
Binding:	18th-century calf over paste boards;  covers decorated with a border of two blind rolls and a double gold fillet; gold-tooled spine;  two parchment tabs - probably cut from a leaf of a liturgical manuscript.   Size:  411 x 293 mm.
Leaf size:	385 x 280 mm.
Annotations:	Running heading “Vita ac gesta Alexandri Magni” together with marginal annotations in a 16th-century hand in quires 5-7 of part II;  very occasional pointing hands and “nota” marks;  occasional evidence of early signatures;  note on the front flyleaf by William Hunter discussing the Rome edition of Udalricus Gallus (Ulrich Han) [1470-71].
Decoration:	Principal initials supplied in red with reserved white;  occasional manuscript guide-letters in brown ink.
Imperfections:	None.