Cicero, Rhetorica ad C. Herennium, [Venice, Jenson, c. 1470], modern red calf

CICERO, MARCUS TULLIUS

Rhetorica ad C. Herennium; De inventione [edited by Omnibonus Leonicenus]. Venice: Nicolas Jenson, 1470

2 works in one volume, Royal half-sheet 4to (269 x 178mm.), 68 leaves [a-f¹⁰ g⁸] and 70 leaves [a-g¹⁰], 30 lines, roman type, first page with later decorative border in period style, later illuminated initials in period style, later manuscript incipits, nineteenth-century red morocco gilt by Koehler, in folding box, [G]3-6 in first part repaired with some text supplied in pen facsimile, a few small marginal repairs at end

BOTH FIRST EDITIONS. These are some of the earliest works to be printed by Jenson, who began his printing career in 1470 with Cicero's Letters to Atticus.

LITERATURE:

ISTC ic00672000 & ic00644000

PROVENANCE:

"Vente Salmon no. 342, 130f.", ink note on verso of flyleaf, i.e. M. Salmon of Tours, sale, Paris, L. Poitier, 23 April 1857, actually lot 352; Count Oswald Seilern, booklabel, sale, Christie's, 26 March 2003, lot 48