Alexandra, sive Cassandra … Basel 1546

Alexandra, sive Cassandra: poema quidem obscura etiam doctis appelatum, sed ita … Isacii Tzetzis … commentarijs … Adiectus quoque est Ioannis Tzetzae variarum historiarum liber … & Pauli Lacisii Veronensis ad verbum Latine conversus, nec unquam antea edita. — Basileae. (Colophon:) Basileae, Ex officina Ioannis Oporini, anno salutis humanae M. D. XLVI. Mense Martio.

Basel, Oporinus, March 1546

First separate edition of Lycophron’s Cassandra and editio princeps of Isaac Tetzes commentary and of Ioannis Tzetzes‘  variarum historiam liber.

Folio (280 x 190 mm). α, β4 [but β 2 and β3 see below] A-X4 Y6; *1 (of 4) Aa-ZZ4 Aaa-Lll4 [lacking *2-4 with Gerbelius‘ letter to Oporinus, and blank Lll4]: (8) leaves, 180 p.; (1) leaf, 260 p., (1) leaf.

Ample margins. Watermargin in second part on pages 43-71. Small wormtrack in outer blank margin of number of leaves in second part.

Contemporary limp vellum, manuscript title on spine. Upper hinge broken, text block nearly loosening from its binding.

β 2 and β3 pasted together with β1. It seems that an early owner did not like the protestants Johannes Oporinus and Nicolaus Gerbel in any place of the copy: he pasted a paper strip over both names on the title-page and the colophon of the second part, he asked the bookbinder to cast away the letter of Gerbelius to Oporinus, and in the first part he pasted together β1-3 with Gerbelius‘ castigationes.

Provenance: Cassandra with contemporary marginal annotations in Greek. Ex-libris on paste-down: M. A. Principis Burghesii libri, i. e. a copy of the Borghese library, the ex-libris is of Marcantonio Borghese (1814–1886). This important  library was sold at the end of the 19th cenury. 

Hieronymus, Griech. Geist … no. 183; Hoffmann II 568; VD16 L 7723. Dibdin 209: „This work is now become ectremely scarce, and held in great request“ – written  in 1827.