TACITUS Publius Cornelius [Opera]. P. Cornelii Taciti libri quinque noviter inventi atque cum reliquis eius operibus editi.

Brunet, V, 634 :”édition précieuse” ; Adams, T-21 ; Norton, Italian printers, p. 99 ; Clavreuil & Perier, Les Français à Rome, n° 14 : this copy.

Princeps edition. Fine and important work published in Rome by Etienne Guillery.

“C’est ici que paraissent pour la première fois les livres I à V des Annales de Tacite, ce qui permet de placer cette belle impression romaine parmi les editio princeps” (Brunet).

The text was prepared by Filippo Beroaldo the Younger (Bologna, 1472–Rome, 1518), a protégé of Pope Leo X (Giovanni de’ Medici) who taught rhetoric in Bologna and at La Sapienza University before ending his career as director of the Vatican Library. Beroaldo’s claim to fame is therefore that he published, in this volume, the first five books of the Annals based on a manuscript discovered in Corvey Abbey (Picardy), which is now kept in Florence (Cod. Mediceo I). The precious volume had been virtually extorted from the Picardy monks by a priest from the diocese of Liège, Jean Heitmers, before falling into the hands of Leo X.

The pontiff, fond of books and manuscripts, cared so little about the dubious provenance of this treasure that he declared, in a letter to Heitmers: ‘We have sent a copy of the corrected and printed book, with a beautiful binding, to the abbot and monks, to take the place of the stolen manuscript in the library. So that they may recognise that this theft has brought them more profit than harm, we have granted them a plenary indulgence for their church.’

It should be noted that of the thirty books of Tacitus’ Histories and Annals, more than half have been lost: only the first four books and part of the fifth remain for both works, plus, in the case of the Annals, part of book VI and everything between the second half of book IX and the first half of book XVI. In addition to the Annals and Histories, this volume contains the Life of Agricola, Germania, the Dialogue of the Orators, and introductory pieces (dedication to Leo X, address to the reader, letter from Leo X, etc.).

The printing of the work was entrusted to one of the best Roman typographers of the time, the Frenchman Étienne Guillery († 1527), originally from Lunéville. Guillery settled in Rome in 1506 and was initially a bookseller at the University and a publisher before acquiring the equipment of the printer Johann Besicken and embarking on a career as a typographer in 1509. Between 1510 and 1514, he had Ercole Nani, a printer from Bologna, as his partner; in 1519, he worked briefly with Antonio Blado. His output – which includes a large number of bulls, speeches, papal prints and other lampoons – is not always signed.

“Guillereti’s first work after the end of the partnership [with J. Besicken] was his most important, the edition of Tacitus of 1 March 1515” (Norton).

Of this rare and important edition USTC locates only three institutional copies in the United States: Austin Texas (Harry Ransom), Chicago University, and North Carolina (Chapel Hill), 

A fine copy with large margins, in an elegant contemporary Italian binding. Handwritten bookplate on the title page and numerous old annotations in the margins; wormholes at the beginning and end of the volume, with no loss of text; small water stains at the edges of the margins on a few pages.

From the institutional library of Notre-Dame de la Flèche with their stamp on the title.