Lot 10
  • 10

Maimonides [Moses Ben Maimon]

Estimate
25,000 - 35,000 USD
Log in to view results
bidding is closed

Description

  • Maimonides [Moses Ben Maimon]
  • De Regimine Sanitatis ad Soldanum Babyloniae. Florence: apud Sanctum Jacobum de Ripoli, [about 1481]
  • ink, paper, sheepskin
Chancery quarto (201 × 139 mm). Collation: [a-e8]: 40 leaves, colophon e8r, verso blank.. 26 lines (variable because of copyfitting problems). Type 4:105R. Initial spaces, those in quires a-c with printed guides. Unrubricated. Some foxing, light dampstain. Early marginal notes; light foxing. Nineteenth-century half calf, marbled boards, spine removed, upper cover loose.

Provenance

Strozzi family, Florence (stamp of 3 addorsed crescents, crowned, with motto EXPECTO) — Abraham Erlanger

Literature

Goff M-80; Hain 10525*; BMC VI 623 (IA.27063); BSB-Ink M-30; Klebs 643.1; See A. Bar-Sela, H. E. Hoff and E. Faris, Moses Maimonides’ Two Treatises on the Regimen of Health, Philadelphia, 1964 (Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 54 pt. 4). The attribution of the translation to Armengaud Blasius of Montpellier, as in BSB-Ink, rests on a mistaken reference.

Condition

Unrubricated. Some foxing, light dampstain. Early marginal notes; light foxing. Nineteenth-century half calf, marbled boards, spine removed, upper cover nearly loose.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Catalogue Note

First Latin edition. Maimonides’ De regimine sanitatis was written in the 1190s as a private manual of health for the Sultan Al-Afdal, son of Saladin. It was translated from Arabic into Hebrew in 1244 by Moses ibn Tibbon, and this was the source for the Latin version made later in the century by the Jewish convert Johannes de Capua, best known for his Directorium vitae humanae, based on a Hebrew version of the Sanskrit Kalilah and Dimna.  It is this Latin version which brought the Maimonides’ Regimen sanitatis to the European Christian world. As printed by the Ripoli press, housed in the Dominican nunnery of Florence under the direction of the convent’s vicar, Fra Domenico, the edition contains also a separate responsum on medical matters that Maimonides wrote for Al-Afdal. About August 1481 the Ripoli press published a Consiglio contra la pestilenza by Marsiglio Ficino (Goff F-153) in the same format, and BMC suggests that the Maimonides Regimen was also a response to the plague outbreak in Florence that summer.