Copy number: B-235(1)

Wanting the blank leaves [a1], [A7-8].

Leaf [d1] bound after [d9].

Binding: English gold-tooled russia, c.1789-90; bound for the Bodleian Library by Christian Samuel Kalthoeber; ticket on front endleaf. On both covers two narrow and a wide fillet form a frame with small floral tools at the corners; roll of oval dots and lozenges on the edges of the boards; each of seven compartment on the spine is contained by two gilt fillets; in the second author and title; in the fourth printer's name; in the five other compartments a small eight-petalled flower tool; marbled pastedowns, and gilt-edged leaves; the gold stamp of the Library on both covers.

Size: 350 × 249 × 55 mm.

Size of leaf: 334 × 225 mm.

Some ‘nota' marks and pointing hands. Note on collation, by Ingram Bywater, dated Apr. 1884, and attached to the front endleaf.

South German decoration. Principal initials at the beginning of each book are supplied in blue, pink or red on burnished gold grounds, the gilt with punch-dotting, the initials with foliate scrolling, within segmented frames of red and green, blue, and green, or red and blue, and with fine foliate border extensions in red, pink, green, blue, grey, and gold, and dotting in silver, now oxidized to grey-black. On [c2r] the foliate border includes the coat of arms of Georg Beck. Paragraph marks and chapter numbers supplied in red or blue.

Provenance: Georg Beck [Peck] (fifteenth/sixteenth century); coat of arms (see above): sable, on a chevron gules, three crescents reversed argent. Pietro-Antonio Bolongaro-Crevenna (1735-1792); Catalogue (1789), lot 1546, was, according to the annotated sale catalogue, sold to van den Bergh for Fl. 60, the equivalent of £5. 5. 0, according to the exchange rate used by Thomas Payne at the sale; described as ‘m[aroquin] r[ouge], d[oré] s[ur] t[ranche]'. The decoration is described . . . ‘dont la premier page est ornée d'une lettre capitale, & d'ornements peints en or & en couleurs'; Pinelli Sale Catalogue (1789), lot 6419 was, according to the annotated sale catalogue, bought in by Edwards, the auctioneer, at £5. 10. 0; the present binding is English and made for the Bodleian Library; it is not impossible that this is the Crevenna copy, rebound, but it is more likely that it is the Maffeo Pinelli (1735-1785) copy sold to the Bodleian by James Edwards after the sale, although Edwards in his Catalogue of a Select Collection of Ancient and Modern Books (London, 1790), no. 5, offered the copy for £8. 8. 0; possibly bought with a rebate by the Bodleian; for an analogous case see E‑041(1). Purchased in for £6. 6. 0; see Books Purchased (1790), 6.

SHELFMARK: Auct. L 1.16.

Copy number: B-235(2)

Binding: Nineteenth-century quarter brown morocco with gold-tooled spine and marbled boards, bound for Bywater.

Size: 317 × 235 × 55 mm.

Size of leaf: 305 × 215 mm.

Pagination in black ink; page numbers also added to list of contents. Marginal annotations in black ink in a number of different hands.

Initials are supplied in blue, within a red pen-work frame and with red pen-work infill, and with some colouring in green. Paragraph marks are supplied in red or blue. Numbers or titles of books are supplied in black ink.

Provenance: Ingram Bywater (1840-1914); Elenchus, no. 629; probably purchased in 1878 for M.150, from Beck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Nördlingen; slip from catalogue, no. 68, pasted in on the pastedown. Bequeathed in 1914.

SHELFMARK: Byw. B 3.1.