Extent: fols. 59; parchment; 163 x 114 (111 x 75) mm bound to 167 x 119 mm
Note:
Layout: 1 column, 25 lines Script: Rounded Italian gothic bookhand influenced by humanistic script Binding: Bound in modern parchment over pasteboard, reusing leaves from another manuscript (a sixteenth-century Prayerbook?), and reusing earlier flyleaves, smooth spine, in very good condition, old (19th-century?) fitted green card case. Ink flaking on some leaves (text remains legible, if faint on a few leaves), occasional passages rewritten in darker ink, some old stains and discoloration to first and last leaves, overall very good condition. Provenance: Purchased from Les Enluminures Ltd, 2021 Provenance: Written in Italy, most likely in Northern Italy, c. 1440-1460, based on the evidence of the script, ruling pattern, and decoration. Provenance: Inside front cover, eighteenth-century(?) shelf mark in brown ink: “B 3 36.” Pietro d’Abano, Trattati dei veneni; after the dedication to the Pope (whose identity is debated), the author goes on to introduce the six sections of his work, beginning with the division of the poisons; partial modern edition of the Latin text by Alberico Benedicenti (1949); English translation, Brown, 1924; a new scholarly edition by Alba Aguilera as part of her doctoral thesis defended at the Autonomous University of Barcelona in 2018 is planned for publication. First printed in 1472 in Mantua, it survives in at least nineteen incunable editions (Collard, 2015), and 72 Latin manuscripts, but in only 27 manuscripts in Italian, not including this manuscript (Collard, 2015, Annex no. 3; Aguilera, 2018, lists 56 manuscripts, all Latin). Only four manuscript copies, two in Latin, are known in the United States, one at the Library of the New York Academy Medicine, the other at the Morgan Library and Museum (Collard, 2015; De Ricci, 1961, pp. 1311, 1464); an Italian translation was sold by Les Enluminures in 2019 (formerly TM 989). Pietro d’Abano (c. 1250-1316) was a famous Paduan physician, philosopher, and astrologer. He obtained a degree in medicine and philosophy in Paris in the late thirteenth century, before returning to teach in Padua. After returning to Padua, Pietro was in trouble with the Church, being accused of heresy and magic. He may have had to face the Inquisition, but these details of his life are disputed, some scholars rejecting them as fifteenth- and sixteenth-century fabrications. Thanks to the support of powerful patrons, Pietro was exonerated in 1306, and in 1314 he was offered the chair of medicine at the University of Treviso. Previous shelfmark: Pietro d'Abano, Trattati Dei Veneni
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