Crastonus, Dictionarium graecum, Venice, Aldus, 1497, later vellum

CRASTONUS, JOHANNES

Lexicon Graeco-latinum [with other grammatical tracts]. Venice: Aldus Manutius, December 1497

Super-Chancery folio (297 x 207mm.), 244 leaves, a-i κ⁸ l¹⁰ A-K⁸ L¹⁰ M⁸ N¹⁰ O p-r⁸ s⁶ t⁸, 42 lines, text in Latin and Greek, one woodcut initial on O1, initial spaces with printed guides, with final blank leaf, some early annotations (including a few additions to the dictionary and notes on the Greek alphabet on front flyleaf), old manuscript foliation, later vellum, early printed leaves used as boardliners, in modern drop-back box, some repaired wormholes, occasional light foxing or staining, binding renewed, lacking two pairs of ties

Crastone's Greek-Latin lexicon was first printed in 1476 and was based on earlier work by Lascaris and other Greek scholars; this is the third edition, to which additional grammatical tracts and other supplementary material have been added. The index of Latin terms was provided by Aldus, who in his preface ad lectorem (O4v) explains how to use the dictionary and its index, starting with the advice that readers should first number the leaves as the index provides leaf and line numbers for each entry.

"[I]ts selection by Aldus as part of his programme of Greek publication demostrates its status as the pre-eminent Greek lexicon of the late fifteenth century" (J. Considine, Dictionaries in Early Modern Europe, 2008, p.28). Crastone also produced a Latin-Greek lexicon to aid composition in Greek.

LITERATURE:

Aldo Manuzio tipografo 18; ISTC ic00960000; Renouard 1497/7; UCLA 16

PROVENANCE:

Ludus Lamotte, inscriptions in Greek and roman letters on flyleaf