Author: GIOVIO (Paulo):
Title: Dialogo dell' Imprese Militari et Amorose Di Monsignor Giouio Vescouo di Nocera. Et del S. Gabriel Symeoni Fiorentino. Con un ragionamento di M. Lodovico Domenichi, nel medesimo fogetto. Con la Tavola.
Description: In Lyone, Appresso Gulielmo Rouillio. 1574. 8vo, 173 x m112 mms., pp. 280 [281 - 393 indexes], with vignette on title-page, engraved portrait of the author on the verso of the title-page, and 137 emblematic figures in the text, handsomely bound in 19th century basket-weave morocco, title in gilt on spine, all edges, a very attractive and near-fine (title-page slightly foxed, corners a little worn) copy, with the Wrest Park bookplate on the front paste-down end-paper, and the recent bookplate of John L. Nevinson on the verso of the front free end-paper. Nevinson (1984 - 1985) was a curator and costume historian, working both in the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. The spectacular library at West Park in Bedforshire is about as impressive provenance as one could want. Paulo Giovio (19 April 1483 – 11 December 1552) began his impressive career studying medicine at Padua, but he later achieved fame in several fields, as a historian, a biographer, and prelate. The present work was published posthumously in 1555 and is one of the most famous emblem books to own. The wood-engraved emblems and portraits were all drawn by Thomas Arane. Guido Arbizzoni in his essay, "Impresse as Emblemss: The European Reputation of an 'Italian' Genre" The Italian Emblem: A Collection of Essays (2007), begins with an unarguable opening assertion: "The posthmuous publication in 1555, of Dialogo dell' Imprese Militari et Amorose...was a turning point at which a 'fashionable' phenomenon began to become an object of investigation and cataloguing in written texts entirely devoted to it." There are numerous digital copies and paperback reprints of the work, but none can come even close to 16th century editions in the clarity of the images. A. Adams, S. Rawles et Saunders, A Bibliography of French Emblem Books of the XVIth and XVIIth Centuries, F.270.

Keywords: Emblem binding literature


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