Bod-Inc: A-048

Aesopus

Fabulae.

 

Analysis of Content

a1r Valla, Laurentius: ‘Prologus epistolaris’ [addressed to] Arnaldus Fonolleda, secretary to King Alphonsus of Naples. Studi sul Panormita e sul Valla, ed. L. Barozzi and R. Sabbadini, R. Istituto di studi superiori pratici e di perfezionamento, Sezione di filosofia e filologia, 25 (Florence, 1891), 80 no. 41, where the letter is dated to 24 May 1440, although with a note recording another recension which gives the date as 1 May 1438; the earlier date is supported by Valla, Epistole, 171. Valla, in a letter to Johannes Aretinus, dated 1439, records that he translated the fables in the previous year: ‘transtuli anno superiore tres et triginta Fabellas Esopi . . .': see Valla, Epistole, 191 no. 11.

a1r Aesopus: [Fabulae.] Translated from the Greek by Laurentius Valla. Valla's translation is discussed in Th. O. Achelis, ‘Die Aesopübersetzung des Lorenzo Valla', Münchener Museum, 2/3 (1913), 239-78, and Th. O. Achelis, ‘Heinrich Eckert von Homberchs Ausgabe von Lorenzo Vallas Aesop und der Codex Urb. Lat. 886', Münchener Museum, 5 (1929), 202-9. For a concordance of Valla's fables with those in Aesopus (ed. Hunger–Hausrath) see Berrigan 22, although this does not appear to correspond with the order of the fables in this edn. The sources of Valla's translation are discussed in Chauncey E. Finch, ‘The Greek Sources of Lorenzo Valla's Translation of Aesop's Fables’, Classical Philology, 55 (1960), 118-20.

Imprint

Imprint: Deventer: Jacobus de Breda, [between 5 Apr. and 9 Aug. 1490.] 4°.

Remarks: As dated in ILC.

Collation

Collation: a⁶.

Illustrations: Woodcut on a6v, representing the Mass of St Gregory, is from a block originally used for the ‘Libellus de modo confitendi et poenitendi' (Deventer: Jacobus de Breda, 5 April 1490). Above the woodcut is the title ‘Esopus grecus per Laurentium vallensem traductus.’

References

ISTC: ia00105000

GW: GW 321;

Hain: HC 321;

Goff: Goff A‑105;

BMC: BMC IX 75;

Proctor: Pr 9069;

Others: Campbell 32; CR 105; HPT II 413; ILC 18; Oates 3551; Sheppard 6991.

LCN: 14335805

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