Martialis, Venice, Aldo, 1501, contemporary English brown calf, fine paper, Robert Pember's copy, containing a contemporary manuscript of an unrecorded variant text of Surrey's translation of Martial

Martialis, Marcus Valerius. Martialis. (Venice: Aldo Manuzio, December 1501)

First Aldine edition of Martial's Epigrammata. A second copy containing a contemporary manuscript of an unrecorded variant text of Surrey's translation of Martial's epigram (X, xlvii) "Martial, the thinges for to attayne …," first published on 20 January 1547, the day after Surrey was executed.

The present text, written, on the terminal blank, begins "Warner the thinges for to obtayne | the happy lyfe | be thes I fynde

| the Riches left | got w' no payne | the fruytefull grow[n]de | yc quiet my[n]de. …"

The text is written in a neat Secretary hand signed with the initials "H.S." in conscious imitation of Surrey's own signature, suggesting that the copy was made from an autograph manuscript; also with two notes to the text in the same hand (A7v and C4v).

See Anthony S. G. Edwards, "Surrey's Martial Epigram: Scribes and Transmission" in Scribes and Transmission in English manuscripts 1400–1700, Vol; 12, ed. Peter Beal and A. S. G. Edwards (London, 2005), pp. 74–82, where the Brooker Martialis is cited on pp. 75–76; and A Critical Edition of the Poems of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, ed. William McGaw (Lewiston, 2012), which assigns the Brooker volume siglum "Pe": "Transcription on the last blank leaf of a copy of Martial, Epigrammata, Venice 1501 … A copy of 44, beginning 'Warner the thinges for to obtayne' and subscribed 'H S', in an early-mid sixteenth century hand. The addressee is presumably Sir Edward Warner. The name 'Robert Pember' occurs on the page facing the poem. … The poem may have been transcribed by someone close to Surrey or his family" (p. 469); "Either Pember or someone close to Surrey or his family may have entered the poem in the volume" (p. 320).

8vo (158 x 97 mm). Italic types, 30 lines plus headline. Printed on fine paper. collation: A–Z⁸ &⁸: 192 leaves (&8 blank). 6- and 7-line initial spaces with guide-letters, colophon (&7r) includes printer's warning against piracy. (Occasional staining, chiefly mrginal.)

binding: Contemporary English brown calf (164 x 108 mm), covers with border of three blind fillets around sides, vellum waste from a fourteenth-century manuscript used in binding and visible at front pastedown, plain edges. (Worn, rebacked, corners repaired.)

provenance: Unidentified owner(s), illegible contemporary signature at top of title-page, heavily annotated in an early (probably sixteenth-century English) humanistic hand — Robert Pember (d. 1560), inscription, "Robertus Pemberus," at end, facing verses on opposite flyleaf written in neat secretary hand, subscribed "H.S." (i.e. Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, 1516?-1547) — Sotheby’s London, 13-14 March 1979, lot 443; purchased by — Alan G. Thomas, London (£400). acquisition: Purchased from Alan G. Thomas, 1980. references: UCLA 47; Adams M689; Aldo Manuzio tipografo 49; Edit16 36108; Renouard 30/7; USTC 841150