Lactantius, Institutiones Divinae, Venice, Paolo Manuzio & Heirs of Torresano, 1535, Roman dark brown morocco, ca. 1540 for Gaspar de la Hoz

Lactantius, Lucius Caecilius Firmianus. Diuinarum institutionum libri septem proxime castigati, et aucti. Eiusdem De ira Dei liber I De opificio Dei liber I Epitome in libros suos, liber acephalos. Phoenix. Carmen de dominica resurrectione. Item index ineundem rerum omnium. Tertulliani liber apologeticus cum indice. Venice: Paolo Manuzio & Heirs of Andrea Torresano, March 1535

Second Aldine edition; in a contemporary Roman binding for Gaspar de la Hoz. "Gaspar is first recorded in Rome in 1526, practising as a municipal notary. By 1542, he was working for the Curia, as a Scriptor cancellarie; he still held that office in 1550. In 1549, he became a clerk of the College of Cardinals. Along the way, Gaspar accumulated honours and rewards. In 1534, he took an oath of fealty to St Peter and to his vicar the pope, becoming Miles Sancti Petri, an honorary knight in the papal militia. By 1548, he had acquired an ecclesiastical benefice in the diocese of Segovia. … As an untonsured layman, a Segovian ecclesiastical benefice could have been granted to Gaspar only with a papal dispensation. Gaspar possibly was supported in his request for the canonry by Alfonso de Villareal, Clericus Segobien" (Halwas).

The name of the author, “Lectantii Firmiani,” is lettered in gold up the spine. The binding is evidence of how the new fashion for shelving books upright, side-by-side, with spines facing out, was then spreading across Rome. This practice had probably originated with Hernando Colón (Ferdinand Columbus), whose large library in Seville was organized in this way, and who mandated the continuance of the arrangement in his testament (3 July 1539). Several Spaniards residing in Rome, notably Luis de Torres and Fernando de Torres (see Bibliotheca Brookeriana lots 77, 225, 710, 875; 8, 330), and the diplomat Cardinal Giovanni Salviati, who commuted between Rome and the court in Toledo and Seville, promptly adopted it, but with a particular innovation: gilt spine titles. Their Roman bindings are the earliest anywhere to have titles tooled in gilt on the spine. This binding for Gaspar de la Hoz, the only known survivor of his library, is probably a decade later.

8vo (157 x 95 mm). Italic type, 30 lines plus headline. collation: aa⁸ bb⁴ a-z⁸ A-T⁸ V⁴ *⁴ X-Z⁸ AA-CC⁸ DD¹² EE-HH⁸: 448 leaves (signature * bound after signature V). Woodcut Aldine device on title-page and final verso, contemporary marginalia throughout, flyleaves extensively annotated. (Intermittent staining and light spotting, a few blank torn corners, quire FF browned.)

binding: Contemporary Roman dark brown morocco (163 x 108 mm), probably Niccolò Franzese ca. 1540, gilt and blind fillet borders with gilt leaf at outer angles, central roundel composed of a gilt fillet and trefoils containing GAS | DE.LA | HOZ on upper cover and four floral tools forming cross on lower, spine title lettered longitudinally, three bands, gilt and gauffered edges, with binder's waste from vellum manuscript fragments. Housed in a modern clamshell by Brockman. (Rebacked retaining most of the original spine, edges repaired.)

provenance: Gaspar de la Hoz (fl. 1534-1549), supralibros — unidentified owner, contemporary marginalia — unidentified owner, endleaves annotated — Sotheby's London, 21 November 1989, lot 106 — Patrick King Rare Books, Stony Stratford, purchased in previous sale (£1,210) — Patrick King Rare Books, Catalogue 15, Stony Stratford [1991], item 34 (£3,500; reproduced). acquisition: Purchased from Patrick King, Stony Stratford, 1991. references: UCLA 278; Renouard 113/2; Edit16 27234; USTC 837074; Robin Halwas, "A Roman binding for Gaspar de La Hoz" (https://www.robinhalwas.com/n46-a- roman-binding-for-gaspare-de-la-hoz)