Lucianus Samosatensis. [Greek] Que hoc volumine continentur. Luciani Opera. Icones Philostrati. Eiusdem Heroica.Eiusdem uitae Sophistarum. Icones Iunioris Philostrati. Descriptiones Callistrati. (Venice: Aldo Manuzio, February 1503) One of just two Greek books in the Pillone Library, with a very fine fore-edge painting of the author by Cesare Vecellio (Anthony Hobson stated that a copy of Theocritus was the only one of Antonio Pillone's books in Greek “The Pillone Library,” in The Book Collector 7 [1958], pp. 29–37). Second edition in Greek of Lucian's Dialogues and editios princeps of the supplemental texts of Philostratus of Athens, Philostratus of Lemnos, and Callistratus. About 1580, Odorico Pillone commissioned a local artist, Cesare Vecellio (1521–1601), then engaged in painting a series of portraits of Pillone family members, to decorate some 170 books accumulated in the family library at Villa Castelardo di Trichiana, near Belluno. These included not only the volumes he had acquired himself, but those, like the ready-bound Lucian, purchased by his father. Many (if not all) the books in his library were shelved with their backs to the wall and fore-edges exposed. Some fore-edges had been earlier lettered with the titles of the volumes, and Vecellio was obliged to work his decoration around this lettering; if no lettering was present, he wrote the author’s name (often abbreviated) horizontally across the lower fore-edge, or vertically from the top to the bottom of the foreedge. Vecellio usually contented himself with a single, boldly colored figure, such as the author, in the act of writing (as here), or composed a scene suggestive of the contents. He apparently worked with specific instructions provided by Odorico, some of which have survived as notes on the inside upper cover. Twenty-one volumes, bound entirely in vellum, received designs in pen and ink on their covers.
See lot 52, Bibliotheca Brookeriana, sale, 11 October 2023.
Super-Chancery folio (309 x 208 mm). Greek and roman type, 55 lines plus headline. collation: α-ω8 αα-δδ8 εε2 ζζ-μμ8 νν6: 288 leaves. Woodcut Aldine device on title-page and νν6v, initial spaces ranging from 3- to 10- lines with guide-letters. (Very small section of worming to lower margin of front flyleaf and title-page, small, light stain to very top margins of Λ3–ρ6.) binding: Venetian russet goatskin over waste pasteboards (321 x 222 mm), likely Brescia or Treviso, 1510s, covers paneled in blind, border and frame of repeated arabesque tool flanked by multiple blind fillets, miters, in central panel large arabesque tool repeated four times vertically, traces of four pairs of fabric ties, flat spine in four compartment with three bands, compartments tooled to a diaper pattern by blind fillets, plain endpapers. edges: Fore-edge painted by Cesare Vecellio with a portrait of Lucian sitting at a lectern and writing in a room with pink and blue walls and a marble floor, the author's name lettered vertically in large Greek majuscules ΛΟΥΚIΑΝΟ and in smaller characters at lower fore-edge horizontally ΛΟΥΚIΑΝΟV; the top and bottom edges painted in a marbled pattern. (Extremities rubbed.) provenance: Antonio Pillone (1464-1533), likely his occasional marginalia in Greek; by descent to — Odorico Pillone (1503- 1594), commissioned the artist Cesare Vecellio to decorate the fore-edge, head- and tail-edges; by descent to — Giorgio Pillone (1539–1611) — Paolo Maresio Bazolle (fl. 1874) — Sir Thomas Brooke, 1st Bt. (1830-1908; engraved armorial bookplate) — Humphrey Brooke (1914–1988; consigned to Alan Keen Ltd., London, The Venetian Library Collected at the Close of the XVI Century by Doctor Odorico Pillone and the Sides and Edges Painted by Cesare Vecellio [1947], item 102) — Pierre Berès, Paris (commemorative ex libris [no. 76]; Bibliothèque Pillone [catalogue, hors série, 1957], item 76 — Bartolomé March Servera (1917–1998), bookplate — Christie's, London, 3 June 1998, lot 65. acquisition: Purchased at Christie's via Robin Halwas. references: UCLA 73; Adams L1602; Edit16 63229; Renouard 39/3; USTC 762915
Lucianus Samosatensis. [Greek] Que hoc volumine continentur. Luciani Opera. Icones Philostrati. Eiusdem Heroica.Eiusdem uitae Sophistarum. Icones Iunioris Philostrati. Descriptiones Callistrati. (Venice: Aldo Manuzio, February 1503) One of just two Greek books in the Pillone Library, with a very fine fore-edge painting of the author by Cesare Vecellio (Anthony Hobson stated that a copy of Theocritus was the only one of Antonio Pillone's books in Greek “The Pillone Library,” in The Book Collector 7 [1958], pp. 29–37). Second edition in Greek of Lucian's Dialogues and editios princeps of the supplemental texts of Philostratus of Athens, Philostratus of Lemnos, and Callistratus. About 1580, Odorico Pillone commissioned a local artist, Cesare Vecellio (1521–1601), then engaged in painting a series of portraits of Pillone family members, to decorate some 170 books accumulated in the family library at Villa Castelardo di Trichiana, near Belluno. These included not only the volumes he had acquired himself, but those, like the ready-bound Lucian, purchased by his father. Many (if not all) the books in his library were shelved with their backs to the wall and fore-edges exposed. Some fore-edges had been earlier lettered with the titles of the volumes, and Vecellio was obliged to work his decoration around this lettering; if no lettering was present, he wrote the author’s name (often abbreviated) horizontally across the lower fore-edge, or vertically from the top to the bottom of the foreedge. Vecellio usually contented himself with a single, boldly colored figure, such as the author, in the act of writing (as here), or composed a scene suggestive of the contents. He apparently worked with specific instructions provided by Odorico, some of which have survived as notes on the inside upper cover. Twenty-one volumes, bound entirely in vellum, received designs in pen and ink on their covers.
See lot 52, Bibliotheca Brookeriana, sale, 11 October 2023.
Super-Chancery folio (309 x 208 mm). Greek and roman type, 55 lines plus headline. collation: α-ω8 αα-δδ8 εε2 ζζ-μμ8 νν6: 288 leaves. Woodcut Aldine device on title-page and νν6v, initial spaces ranging from 3- to 10- lines with guide-letters. (Very small section of worming to lower margin of front flyleaf and title-page, small, light stain to very top margins of Λ3–ρ6.) binding: Venetian russet goatskin over waste pasteboards (321 x 222 mm), likely Brescia or Treviso, 1510s, covers paneled in blind, border and frame of repeated arabesque tool flanked by multiple blind fillets, miters, in central panel large arabesque tool repeated four times vertically, traces of four pairs of fabric ties, flat spine in four compartment with three bands, compartments tooled to a diaper pattern by blind fillets, plain endpapers. edges: Fore-edge painted by Cesare Vecellio with a portrait of Lucian sitting at a lectern and writing in a room with pink and blue walls and a marble floor, the author's name lettered vertically in large Greek majuscules ΛΟΥΚIΑΝΟ and in smaller characters at lower fore-edge horizontally ΛΟΥΚIΑΝΟV; the top and bottom edges painted in a marbled pattern. (Extremities rubbed.) provenance: Antonio Pillone (1464-1533), likely his occasional marginalia in Greek; by descent to — Odorico Pillone (1503- 1594), commissioned the artist Cesare Vecellio to decorate the fore-edge, head- and tail-edges; by descent to — Giorgio Pillone (1539–1611) — Paolo Maresio Bazolle (fl. 1874) — Sir Thomas Brooke, 1st Bt. (1830-1908; engraved armorial bookplate) — Humphrey Brooke (1914–1988; consigned to Alan Keen Ltd., London, The Venetian Library Collected at the Close of the XVI Century by Doctor Odorico Pillone and the Sides and Edges Painted by Cesare Vecellio [1947], item 102) — Pierre Berès, Paris (commemorative ex libris [no. 76]; Bibliothèque Pillone [catalogue, hors série, 1957], item 76 — Bartolomé March Servera (1917–1998), bookplate — Christie's, London, 3 June 1998, lot 65. acquisition: Purchased at Christie's via Robin Halwas. references: UCLA 73; Adams L1602; Edit16 63229; Renouard 39/3; USTC 762915
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