Földvári Books

Horace’s Art of Poetry First in Any Vernacular; The True First Edition of Dolce’s Stanze.

Dolce, Lodovico; Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)

La poetica d’Horatio tradotta per Messer Lodovico Dolce. [bound with:] Stanze di M. Lodovico Dolce composte nella Vittoria Africana nouvamente havuta dal Sacratis. Imperatore Carlo Quinto.

In Vinegia [Venezia / Venice]. And: Romae [Rome]: per Francesco Bindoni, & Mapheo Pasini compagni. [S.n.], Del mese di Agosto, MDXXXV [1535]. [Del mese Settembrese l’anno] MDXXXV [1535]. First editions. Woodcut device on the title page of the first book. In later vellum, title lettered on front panel and spine in ink. [48]; [56] p. Firm binding with small damages to the extremities. Humble ownership inscriptions of the title page of the first book. Inside clean, in fine condition.

The first edition of the first translation of Horace’s Art of Poetry into a vernacular language, together with another scarce Dolce-edition, the true first edition of Stanze.

“It would be impossible to overestimate the importance of Horace's Ars Poetica (Art of Poetry) for the subsequent history of literary criticism. Since its composition in the first century B.C.E., this epigrammatic and sometimes enigmatic critical poem has exerted an almost continual influence over poets and literary critics alike […].” (Leitch, 2010) Many phrases of the common literary parlance, like in medias res or ab ovo, are also derived from this work. It was Lodovico Dolce (1508/10–1568), the Italian humanist scholar, who first translated the poem into a modern vernacular language and the first book of the present volume is the first edition of this interpretation.

The second book is also a scarce edition, the true first edition of Dolce’s Stanzas composed on the African victory recently won by the most holy Emperor Charles V., treating the Conquest of Tunis in 1535, the successful capture of the city, then under the control of the Ottoman Empire, by the Habsburg Empire of Charles V and its allies. There is no modern edition of this work (Schwarz, 2015), and many bibliographies identify the Genovese-edition of December 1535 as the first, while the present Rome-edition was published already in September. Scarce, no copies located in libraries outside of Italy according to USTC.

La poetica: CNCE 22696; USTC 835885 Stanze: CNCE 17323; USTC 827051

Literature: Leitch, Vincent B.: The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York; London: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010. p. 119.; Schwarz Lausten, Pia, “ Stanze composte nella vittoria Africana novamente avuta dal sacratissimo Imperatore Carlo Quinto”, in: Christian-Muslim Relations 1500 - 1900, General Editor David Thomas. Consulted online on 25 September 2020

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Price: €5,000.00