Ausonius, Opera, Lyon, 1558, French limp vellum for Hartmann von Liechtenstein und Nikolsburg

Ausonius, Decimus Magnus. D. Magni Ausonii burdigalensis poetae, Augustorum praeceptoris, virique Consularis Opera, tertiae fere partis complemento auctiora, & diligentiore quam hactenus, censura recognita. Cum indice rerum memorabilium. Lyon: Jean I de Tournes, 1558

First printing of Étienne Charpin’s edition of Ausonius, the poet of Bordeaux. The text is based on a ninth-century manuscript that Charpin had discovered in the Benedictine monastery at L’Île-Barbe on the Saône (Leiden, Vossianus lat. F.111). Written in Visigothic minuscules, it contained unedited works, and is now judged to be the most complete and reliable of surviving manuscripts, offering a text far superior to the (lost) manuscript used for the editio princeps (1472). In preparing his edition, Charpin was assisted by Guillaume de la Barge and Antoine d’Albon. Although Chardin is not named on the title-page, poems dedicated to him as the editor are printed (A4v, A6r).

This copy was bound for Hartmann II von Liechtenstein und Nikolsburg (1544–1585). Hartmann had matriculated at Wittenberg (27 June 1560), and sometime thereafter commenced a career in imperial service. In 1574, he retired to devote himself entirely to the economic affairs of the family, and in 1575 bought and demolished a moated castle at Lednice in Moravia, and began building a Renaissance villa. Hartmann seems to have succumbed to bibliomania at this time. In short order he commissioned from French binders a huge number of white vellum bindings, uniformly decorated, with a gold-tooled lozenge centerpiece, his initials (H.H.V.L.V.N.) and a date (M.D.LXXVII or M.D.LXXVIII) on covers.

Writing in 1915, Hanns Bohatta estimated that some 230 of these bindings were then distributed through the approximately 100,000 volumes in the library of the Princes of Liechtenstein in Vienna (Hanns Bohatta, “Die Fürstlich Liechtensteinsche Fideikommißbibliothek in Wien,” in Zentralblatt für Bibliothekswesen 32 (nos. 6–7, June–July 1915), pp. 185–196). At least a dozen volumes became separated from the library at early dates. They include a copy of Juan Luis Vives, Les dialogues (Paris 1577), in France by 1816 (Lyon, Bibliothèque Diderot, 1R 103); Marco Polo, La description géographique des provinces et villes plus fameuses de l'Inde Orientale (Paris 1572), in the imperial library in Vienna; a composite volume (1561 Lyon Claudianus bound with 1560 Lyon Lucanus), and Claude Paradin’s Alliances genealogiqves des rois et princes de Gaule (Lyon 1561); these last two volumes are now part of the Bibliotheca Brookeriana and will be offered in future sales.

8vo (167 x 110 mm). Italic type, with roman, 31 lines plus headline, shoulder-notes. collation: A⁸ a–t⁸: 160 leaves (t8 blank). Woodcut medallion portrait of the author on title-page, woodcut printer's devise on t7v, type-ornament headpiece and decorative rules. Ruled in red. (Some light dampstaining at upper fore-edge corners of quires k–m.)

binding: French limp vellum (175 x 114 mm), 1577, for Hartmann II von Liechtenstein und Nikolsburg, gilt fillet around sides, large gilt arabesque in center, above and below narrow gilt frames enclosing his initials H.H.V.L.V.N. and the date M.D.LXXVII, traces of 2 pairs of fabric ties, a sixteenth-century vellum document (in French) used as binding support, flat spine, 5 gilt false bands, 2-line title in second compartment, gilt floral lozenge in others, edges gilt. (Slightest handling wear.)

provenance: Hartmann II von Liechtenstein und Nikolsburg (supralibros) — “Johanis Prunizak” (?; seventeenth/eighteenth-century inscription) — Raphaël Esmerian (1903–1976; exlibris; Antoine & Étienne Ader, et al., Paris, 6 June 1972, lot 34), purchased by — unidentified owner (FF 4500) — Beaussant Lefèvre & Alain Nicolas, Paris, 30-31 May 2007, lot 316. Purchased by — unidentified owner (€3800). acquisition: Purchased from Bonnefoi Livres Anciens, Paris, 2008.  

references: FB 55401; USTC 152527; Gültlingen, IX, p. 199: 403; Cartier, Bibliographie des éditions des de Tournes, no. 390