Beschreibung:

MACROBIUS, Ambrosius Theodosius (fl. early 5th century). In somnium Scipionis expositio. -Saturnalia . Venice: Nicolaus Jenson, 1472. Median 2° (336 x 229mm). Collation: [1-2 10 3-12 8 13 10 14-20 8 ] (1/1 blank, 1/2r Cicero Somnium Scipionis ex libro de Republica excerptum , 1/4v In Somnium Scipionis expositio , 6/4v blank, 6/5r Saturnalia , 20/6v colophon, 20/7,8 blank). 165 (of 166, without first blank) leaves. 40 lines. Type 1:115(113)R, 115Gk. Very fine 8-line initials opening each work and book supplied in red with red flourishing, 2-line initials mostly supplied in red, red paragraph marks, headlines added in red, spaces for diagrams and occasionally for Greek left blank, some printed guide-letters. (Small piece of blank lower corner cut away from 9/4.) Gold- and blind-tooled blue morocco over pasteboard, sides with border à vermiculures , central panel elaborately tooled with leafy ornaments, spine gilt-tooled in compartments, gilt turn-ins, tan morocco doublures with border tooled in gilt and blind, green endpapers, vellum flyleaves, pink silk ribbon marker, gilt edges, by François Bozerian (fl.ca.1802-1818), with his stamp ( Rel.P.Bozerian Jeune ) at foot of spine. The roll à vermiculures was also used by his brother, Jean-Claude Bozerian, no. 23 in Culot, Jean-Claude Bozerian (1979). Provenance : A.A. Renouard (1765-1853), acquired in 1834 by; Beriah Botfield from Payne & Foss for #21.0.0 (P. & F. Acquisitions, p.60). FIRST EDITION of both works. Macrobius took a dream described in Cicero's De republica as the basis for his exposition on Neoplatonism. It was intended to be accompanied by diagrams charting the spheres, etc., and Jenson provided spaces for most of the required diagrams which were then to be filled in by hand. The Saturnalia is a fictional symposium whose participants were real, but not strictly contemporary, people. On the surface it was a work written for Macrobius's sons' education and edification, and, like Aulus Gellius's Noctes Atticae (see lot 16) on which it draws heavily, the Saturnalia treats a variety of subjects, historical, antiquarian and scientific. Its main theme, however, is a discussion of Virgil, and thus its overriding importance lies in its contribution to establishing the reputation of Virgil in the Middle Ages as a consummate rhetorician and poet of prophetic insight. Although little is known about Macrobius, he was probably the praetorian prefect of Italy in 430 A.D., and his correct name was Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius, mistakenly called Aurelius here and in other editions and manuscripts. (See Alan Cameron, "The Date and Identity of Macrobius," Journal of Roman Studies 56 (1966) 25-38). Renouard, in his Bibliothèque d'un Amateur (III, 237-8) remarked that his copy was an "exemplaire d'une beauté parfaite." HCR 10426; BMC V, 172 (IB. 19655-6); Goff M-8; Flodr, Macrobius 1