Object details
Object number
2.b.1.4
Creator(s)
Title
Concerning Famous Women [De plurimis claris selectisque mulieribus]
Date
29 April 1497
Medium
Printed ink on paper
Language
Latin
Publication Place
Ferrara
Binding Description
Citron crushed levant morocco; double fillets on sides; tooled back; fillets inside; gilt edges
Description
1 Vol. (176 leaves) : ill. ; 32 cm. (folio)
Dimensions
32.2 x 22.9 x 2.9 cm (12 11/16 x 9 x 1 1/8 in.)
Signatures, inscriptions, and markings
Inscribed in pencil (front pastedown): "370"
Stamped (front pastedown): "R. De. Coverly"
Affixed (A1r): bookplate of Isabella Stewart Gardner
Stamped (A1r and z6r): "KUPFERSTICH SAMMLUNG DER KÖNIGL. MUSEEN."
Stamped (A1r and z6r): "H. [or K] Kupferstichkabinet in Berlin veräussert 18.10.1881"
Inscribed (a4v): "Rerum quoru[m]dam particularium a claris mulieribus [?]muedam hic et specialis [?] fabula primo v3. Adiunc et compladine inter primu[m] muedu[m]." [in Latin in a late 15th/16th-century hand]
Inscribed in ink (s3r): underline
Inscribed in pencil (end pastedown): "Ea/w/s"
Inscribed in pencil (end pastedown): illegible [probably bookseller's price-code]
Enclosed: paper, inscribed in pencil "1497"
Enclosed: blue paper, inscribed in pencil: "Bergomensis, Jacobus P"
Enclosed: two photocopies of typed bibliographic descriptions
Provenance
Collection of the Kupferstichkabinett [Museum of Prints and Drawings], Berlin until 18 October 1881.
Purchased by Isabella Stewart Gardner from the bookseller and publisher Bernard Quaritch (1819-1899), London for £31.10 on 10 March 1887, lot 37074.
Commentary
Augustian monk and author, Giacomo Filippo Foresti's illustrated encyclopedia of famous women is arranged chronologically, beginning with Eve. The list includes Biblical women, women from pagan times, Christian women, and notorious women like the legendary medieval female Pope Joan. The last seven women: Bona of Lombardy, Bianca Maria of Milan, Catherine of Imola, Leonora of Ferrara, Bianca Mirandula, Genevra Sforza, and Damisella Trivulzia, are Foresti's contemporaries, and are illustrated with woodcuts that are so full of individual character that they are thought to be based on actual portraits and are therefore among the first woodcut portraits. The other 165 woodcut images are mere types of the women represented in the histories, and not portraits. The classical women and the saints each share a series of woodblocks which are printed repeatedly to fill out the series. Two saints or two goddesses might share a single appropriate woodcut. This sort of typological representation is extremely common in early books.
Bibliography
Bernard Quaritch. Catalogue of the Monuments of the Early Printers... (December 1886 - August 1887), lot 37074.
W.A. Copinger. Supplement to Hain's Repertorium Bibliographicum, Part I (London 1895), no. 2813.
Isabella Stewart Gardner. A Choice of Books from the Library of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Fenway Court (Boston, 1906), p. 9. (as by Fr. Jacobi Philippi Bergomensis; as bound by Roger de Coverly)
Isabella Stewart Gardner. A Choice of Manuscripts and Bookbindings from the Library of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Fenway Court (Boston, 1922), p. 58. (as bound by Roger De Coverly)
Frederick Richmond Goff. Incunabula in American libraries; a third census of fifteenth-century books recorded in North American collections (New York, 1964), no. J204.
Rebecca Karo. Short-Title Catalogue of Highlights from the Book Collection in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Unpublished manuscript. (Boston, 1970s), no. 7. (as by Jacopo Filippo Foresti da Bergamo)
Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin. Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke, no. 07223, accessed 30 August 2016. http://www.gesamtkatalogderwiegendrucke.de/docs/M10959.htm
British Library. Incunabula Short Title Catalogue, no. ij00204000, accessed 30 August 2016. http://istc.bl.uk/search/search.html?operation=record&rsid=545078&q=0#
Consuelo W. Dutschke in Jeffrey F. Hamburger et al. Beyond Words: Illuminated Manuscripts in Boston Collections. Exh. cat. (Boston: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; Newton: McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College; Cambridge: Houghton Library, Harvard University, 2016), pp. 241, 301-302, no. 239, ill.
Gallery
Long Gallery
Case
Dante Case
Rights and reproductions
The use of images, text, and all other media found on this website is limited. Please review Rights and Reproductions for details.
