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Search results for: boethius

Virtue and Knowledge

14 Thursday Sep 2017

Posted by rarebooks in Uncategorized

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Alexander the Great Gualterus de Castellione, allegory, battle, Biblioteca Angelica, Boccaccio, Boethius, Bolognese, Bosone da Gubbio, Campaldino, canticle, Canto, Christian, Cicero, Dante Alighieri, destiny, dialect, Europe, exile, facsimile, Florence, gold, Guelphs, hand-treated paper, hell, Holy Trinity, Italian, Jacopo Alighieri, Latin, littera textualis, manuscript, medieval, miniature, paradise, Petrarch, philosopher, poem, poet, purgatory, scribe, soldier, song, tanned leather, tercets, terza rima, The Divine Comedy, Thomas Aquinas, tripartite stanza, Tuscan, vernacular, Virgil

PQ4301-A1-2016-Devil

“Consider your origin. You were not formed to live like brutes but to follow virtue and knowledge.”

La Divina Commedia Angelica
Dante Alighieri (1265-1321)
Castel Guelfo di Bologna, Italy: Imago la Nobilita del Facsimile, 2016
PQ4301 A1 2016

Facsimile. MS1102 from the Biblioteca Angelica, this late fourteenth century Bolognese codex contains The Divine Comedy, commentary by Jacopo Alighieri and Bosone da Gubbio, and a fragment of a poem written by Alexander the Great Gualterus de Castellione. Each of the Cantos are introduced with a miniature depicting the contents of the song. Thirty-four other miniatures depict scenes from hell in bright colors on a gold background. The manuscript is incomplete. Empty spaces were left for miniatures for the songs of “Paradiso” and “Purgatorio.” It is likely that only one scribe is responsible for the text. The script hand is littera textualis. The facsimile has hand applied gold leaf before each canticle on hand-treated paper. The binding is hand stitched in a naturally tanned leather.

Dante Alighieri, born in Florence, to a notable family but of modest means, was an Italian poet and philosopher. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La divina commedia (The Divine Comedy), a medieval Christian allegory of man’s temporal and eternal destiny. The poet draws on his own experience of exile from his native city, in which he encounters hell, purgatory, and paradise. Along the way, the poet offers analysis of contemporary problems and spiritual wisdom through inventive linguistic imagery. Dante wrote his epic poem in the vivid Italian vernacular, rather than Latin, using primarily a Tuscan dialect which became the literary language in western Europe for centuries. Dante’s use of the vernacular opened his work to an audience broader than the academy.

Dante was classically trained and drew on the works of Virgil, Cicero, Boethius and others for his philosophical thinking. He was also well aware of more contemporary writers such as Thomas Aquinas. A soldier, he fought in the ranks at the battle of Campaldino in 1289 on the side of the Guelphs — a battle instrumental in the reformation of the Florentine constitution.

Dante is credited with inventing terza rima, composed of tercets woven into a linked rhyme scheme. He ended each canto of the The Divine Comedy with a single line that completes the rhyme scheme with the end-word of the second line of the preceding tercet. The tripartite stanza is symbolic with the Holy Trinity. Later Italian poets, including Boccaccio and Petrarch, followed this form.

Facsimile edition of 423 copies, 25 hors de commerce. University of Utah copy is no. 18.

PQ4301-A1-2016-Lion

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Book of the Week – Arithmetica Boetij

14 Monday Jan 2013

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Boethius, Erhard Ratdolt

Arithmetica Boetij, 1488
Arithmetica Boetij, 1488
Arithmetica Boetij, 1488


Arithmetica Boetij
Boethius (d. 524)
Augsburg: E. Ratdolt, 20 May 1488
Editio princips
PA6231 A7 1488

Ancius Manlius Severinuis Boethius, Roman philosopher and statesman, was appointed consul of Rome in 510. A minister under Emperor Theodoric, Boethius was falsely accused of treason, imprisoned, and sentenced to death.  According to tradition, he wrote his great work, The Consolation of Philosophy, while awaiting execution.  His treatise on ancient music was also for many centuries unrivaled as the final authority on Western music. Boethius’ Arithmetica was produced by Erhard Ratdolt as part of his extensive program of astronomical and mathematical publications. The early printed treatise is typical of the classical works used in Western European Renaissance education.

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Book of the Week – Sententiarum Libri IV

17 Monday Dec 2012

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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Albert Magnus, Anton Koberger, Augsburg, blind-stamped, Boethius, bonventura, initials, manuscript, Peter Lombard, printer, proof sheets, theology, Thomas Aquinas

Senentiarum Libri IV, 1500
Senentiarum Libri IV, 1500
Senentiarum Libri IV, 1500

Sententiarum Libri IV
Petrus Lombardus (ca. 1100-1160)
Nuremberg: A. Koberger, 1500
BX1749 P4 1500

Petrus Lombardus (Peter Lombard) was a Medieval French theologian. He taught at the Cathedral school of Notre Dame and towards the end of his life became Bishop of Rome. Written between 1148 and 1151, Sententiarum is a collection of teachings of the Church Fathers. In it Lombardus recognized the role of reason in theology. Until the sixteenth century it was the official textbook of theology in many universities. Hundreds of scholars wrote commentaries on it, among them Thomas Aquinas, Albert Magnus, and Bonaventura. Despite its great influence, the work itself is unoriginal, but it was among the very first attempts to present Christian theology in a systematized form. This edition was printed by Anton Koberger, a significant early printer. Koberger published more than two hundred editions. Because Sententiarum was used as a textbook, it has no decorative initials or other ornaments. This folio is bound in contemporary calf over oak boards, with blind-stamped panels on the sides. The binding is decorated with a roll depicting a hunting scene. The lining papers consist of proof sheets from Boethius’s De Institutione Arithmetica, printed at Augsburg in 1486. These sheets consist of four pages of the book and include diagrams and tables. The proofs are printed on the back of proofs of another and unidentified book. A manuscript note on the title page suggests that it at once belonged to the monastic library of St. Elizabeth at Brescia.

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