Cicero, Marcus Tullius: Epistolae ad familiares.
[Venice]: Nicolaus Jenson, 1471.
4to. [1-310 48 5-810 98 10-1310 148 15-2110]. [204] leaves, the first blank.
Collation as GW, not as Bod-inc.
ISTC ic00508000; Goff C508; BMC V 169; Bod-inc C-261; GW 6806.
| Shelf-mark: | Sp Coll Hunterian Be.3.4 (see main library entry for this item) |
| Note: | Printed on vellum; see Joseph van Praet, 'Catalogue de livres imprimés sur vélin, qui se trouvent dans les bibliothèques tant publiques que particulières', 4 vols (Paris: 1824-8), II, p. 255, no. 549.. |
| Note: | Printer’s pin-holes visible in lower margin of many leaves. |
| Provenance: | Edward Harley (1689-1741), Lord Harley; from 1724 2nd Earl of Oxford: see Binding. Thomas Osborne (d. 1767), bookseller: purchased all the Harleian printed books; no. 5034 in Osborne’s 'Catalogus bibliothecae Harleianae', vol. 1 (London: 1743) and no. 3204 in his 'Catalogus bibliothecae Harleianae', vol. 3 (London: 1744). Philip Carteret Webb (1702-1770), barrister, FSA, FRS: armorial bookplate on front pastedown; lot 2051 in 'A catalogue of the very valuable library of Phillip Carteret Webb ... which will begin to be sold by auction, by S. Baker and G. Leigh ... on Monday, February the 25th, 1771 ...' [London: 1771]. William Hunter (1718-1783), physician and anatomist: probably bought at the sale of Webb’s library. University of Glasgow: Hunterian bequest 1807; Hunterian Museum bookplate and book label on front pastedown, with former shelfmark “Z.7.15”. |
| Binding: | England, 20th-century full brown morocco replacing an English, 18th-century gold-tooled binding in red sheep made for Lord Harley by Christopher Chapman; rebound in May, 1965, and given new endpapers, by Douglas Cockerell & Son, whose binder’s note is tipped-in at rear. A side from the original Harleian binding is mounted on the inside of the rear board; the preserved cover has a design of triple fillets forming a frame, within which is a single ornamental roll containing coronets (not reproduced among the Chapman rolls illustrated in Nixon ‘Harleian bindings’, pl. 14). The cover also has a lozenge-shaped centre-piece, made up of several individual tools including Nixon ‘Harleian bindings’, pl. 15, Chapman nos 1a, 1b, 9, 12, 14a, and 14b. Original spine covering not preserved or recorded. Marbled endpapers. Size: 282 x 190 mm. |
| Leaf size: | approx. 270 x 182 mm. |
| Annotations: | Marginal and interlinear corrections in a humanist hand in gatherings 1-5; gatherings signed in an early hand on first recto; foliated in an early hand “1”-“29” (“28” repeated) from 1/2-4/1 (ff. 2-31). |
| Decoration: | Six-line initial “Q” at the beginning of book 2 on 2/5r (f. 15r) supplied in shades of green on a square saffron-coloured ground embellished with russet floral decoration and a pattern of three brown dots; initials at the beginning of books 3-16 supplied in gold on a square blue ground embellished with white-vine decoration and a pattern of three white dots; other initials supplied in alternate red and blue throughout, with guide-letters in brown ink frequently visible; large area of offsetting of red pigment on the otherwise blank 21/10r (f. 204r). |
| Imperfections: | Wanting the first blank leaf; six-line initial "E" on 1/2r excised. |
