Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) Lot n° 40

Comento di Christophoro Landino fiorentino sopra la Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta fiorentino [The Comedia]. Florence, Niccolò di Lorenzo della Magna, August 30, 1481. Three parts in one folio volume (410 x 268 mm), (369) ff. of 372 ([pi]8 2[pi]5 a10 b8 c-e10 f8 g10 h-i8 l10 m-n8 o-r10 s6 aa-gg10 hh12 ll-mm10 oo6 (aaa)8 B-H10 I6 L12). Missing 3 blank leaves 2[pi]6, a1, aa1 (one of the last two blanks has been bound at the head). Red long-grained morocco ca 1800, spine ribbed and decorated with gilt fillets and cold boxes, gilt title, boards decorated with gilt fillets, cold scroll and spandrels, decorated inner edges and spines, gilt edges, modern lined slipcase. (Spine faded; a few small marginal restorations without affecting the text, small scattered marginal foxing.) First illustrated edition of the Divine Comedy, by the engraver Baccio Baldini after Sandro Botticelli. It is also the first edition of the Divine Comedy printed in Florence, Dante's native city, and the second Florentine illustrated book. It was compiled by the humanist Cristoforo Landino, and includes the original edition of his commentary, which was a lasting success until the 17th century. Landino's commentary and the text of his friend Marsilio Ficino, "Ad Dantem gratulatio", inserted in the prose, contributed decisively to the building of the cult of Dante. A copy of the original contract for the edition recently discovered by Lorenz Böninger in the Florence archives indicates a print run of 1125 copies. It states that the edition was to be illustrated, but no further details are given. The blank spaces left by the printer at the beginning of each song indicate that the original plan included a large series of engravings to accompany each of the 100 songs of the three canticles (Hell, Purgatory, Paradise). However, only 19 of them were made. The insertion of the images into the text proved to be technically difficult, and after various unsuccessful attempts, the engravings were printed on separate sheets, cut out and glued in the spaces reserved for this purpose. Only the engravings of songs 1 and 2 were printed directly on the page. Moreover, the number of engravings present varies from one copy to another, some of them not containing any. This copy belongs to the first category of the classification established by Arthur Hind (Early Italian Engraving. A critical catalog...): it contains two engravings, those of the first two chants of the Inferno (leaves a1 recto and b1 verso), printed directly in the white spaces. Since the contract does not specify the designer or the engraver, we must turn to Vasari to learn that Sandro Botticelli was responsible for the drawings, from which Baccio Baldini then engraved the copperplates, a collaboration that is accepted today by most scholars. Goldsmith, niello maker, engraver and draftsman, Baldini (ca 1436-1487) was a follower of Maso Finiguerra and worked in Botticelli's entourage. With a production of about one hundred pieces - none of which are signed - he is considered the most important Florentine engraver of the first generation of these artists. The 19 prints for the Divine Comedy - among the first examples of copperplate engraving in Italy - are probably his last works. Indeed, the production of engravings for the Landino edition was interrupted in 1487, the year of Baldini's death, but also of the publication of a new illustrated edition of the Divine Comedy, printed in Brescia by Bonino Bonini. PROVENANCE Giovanbattista di Meo del Fontana (handwritten inscription dated Florence, 1512), "cartolaio nel gharbo" according to the handwritten inscription on the verso of the same folio, i.e. paper maker in the Garbo district of Florence, one of the suppliers of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo; Maestro Andrea di Domenico da San Gimignano, "priore di San Piero di Mucchio [i.e. San Gimignano]", purchased in Florence on December 15, 1530 from the said Meo del Fontana (handwritten inscription); Frederic North, 5th Earl of Guilford (1766-1827) (heraldic bookplate); Joost Ritman (bookplate "Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica"). REFERENCES Goff D29; Hain *5946; Pellechet 4114 & 4114A; GW 7966; ISTC id00029000; Konrad Oberhuber, "Baccio Baldini," Early Italian Engravings from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1973, pp. 13-39.