Georgicorum liber cum novo commentario Hermanni Torrentini
Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Elder, 1508.
Price: $20,000.00
[Bound with]:
Aeneis cum familiari expositione annexo quoque vocabulorum in dice iuxta seriem alphabeti
Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch the Elder, April 1509
Quarto: 20 x 14.6 cm. I. (Georgics) LXXXI, [3] lvs. Collation: a8, b-d4, e8, f-h4, i8, k-m4, n8, o-p4, q8
II. (Aeneid) CCCXC, [6] lvs. Collation: a-z8, A-Z8, Aa-Cc8 (blank leaf Cc7 present), [i]4. With an added quire of
A profusely-annotated sammelband containing Virgil’s Georgics, with the commentary of the Dutch humanist Hermann Torrentinus (ca. 1450- ca. 1520), bound with an edition of the Aeneid edited by Johann Schott (1477-1548), which includes the Thirteenth Book written by Maffeo Vegio (1406 or 7- 1458).
BINDING: Bound in contemporary half pigskin -richly tooled in blind- over wooden boards, with clasps, catches, and binding straps all preserved. The pigskin richly tooled in blind. Pigskin soiled, with minor damage at the head of the spine and in the second compartment, with another small tear at the foot of the spine. The boards exhibit some light wear and are peppered with a small number of pinprick wormholes. With slivers of binder’s waste from a thirteenth- or fourteenth-century missal or breviary visible at the inner hinges.
CONDITION. The texts are in excellent condition, with numerous deckles along the lower edge of the leaves in the Aeneid. The first few quires of the volume are a little loose; the title and its conjugate (leaf VIII) are are detached but whole. Small tear in blank lower margin of leaf XXIII. Light damp-stains in the outer margins of a few gatherings (c-h) of the Aeneid; another small dampstain in the gutter of gathering Cc; small stains to a few leaves in Aeneid gatherings o-p, and a few tiny wormholes in the index leaves at the close of the volume.
ANNOTATIONS: A heavily-annotated volume, with an additional quire of eight leaves bound at the front with collectanea on the Georgics, including two full-page diagrams illustrating passages in Georgics I. One is celestial-astrological, showing the zodiac, seasons, winds, and cardinal directions; the second is terrestrial, showing the five climatic zones. The former is accompanied by drawings of constellations: the Pleiades [Virgil’s “Atlantides”], Serpens, Ursa Minor, Ursa Major, and Corona Borealis [“Ariadne’s Crown”].
The entire text of the Georgics and the first seven books of the Aeneid are densely annotated in a contemporary hand with extensive marginalia, interlinear glosses, and long passages of annotations on both title pages (including a discussion of the origins of Latin poetry) and the final blank page of the Georgics.
REFERENCES: I. (Georgics) VD16 V 1538. Adams V 544. Schweiger II, 1193; II. (Aeneid) VD16 V 1409. Adams V 554. Schweiger I, 1196