D'Alessandro - Paragone de' Cavalieri - 1711

ONE OF THE RAREST AND MOST IMPORTANT WORKS ON HORSEMANSHIP - IN FOLIO - RICHLY ILLUSTRATED
First edition of this very important work on horsemanship, horse care, history and technique of fencing.
La Pietra paragone de’ cavalieri is a masterpiece of late Italian Baroque that unites technical treatise, Marinist poetry, and chivalric culture, offering a unique insight into the equestrian world of the Kingdom of Naples. Divided into five books, the work discusses riding, breaking, the variety of bits, the complex riding grounds (the “circoli seu torni”) and the horse’s medicine. All of this is accompanied by an imposing iconographic apparatus: 140 full-page copper engravings, including portraits of Neapolitan fencers, marks of horse breeds, allegorical figures, and even a rhinoceros inspired by Dürer.
Text celebrated from the outset by the public, it enjoyed great fortune among nobles, fencers, and scholars of veterinary sciences.
Cf. Bibl. generale della scherma, 59-60; Brunet I, 159; D’Afflitto, 212, the work “was received by the public with applause,” also for its rich iconographic apparatus: the text is accompanied by numerous illustrations of riding tracings, animals (including the rhinoceros of Dürer-inspired origin), portraits of illustrious Neapolitan figures in the fencing of his time, both on horseback and in a half-bust, and an incredibly wide assortment of bits. Huth p. 28. Brunet I, 159. Graesse I, 68.
A COPY AVAILABLE ONLINE FOR EUR 25,000.00

CONDITION REPORT
In-folio (mm 355x225). Generally well-preserved leaves, including half-title, portrait and title page intact, in addition to 140 engravings, all intact and inked.
Physiological browning in the text, absolutely not distracting.
The 142 engravings, besides the frontispiece, are complete and well preserved.
Double contemporary flyleaves (2 + 2) perfectly preserved, with an old manuscript ex libris on the recto of the first flyleaf.
Contropiatti on decorated paper originally. Fully gilded edges and dry-point engraving.
From p. 63 to p. 73, professional restoration with loss of some words in titles and text, no illustration involved.
Extremely refined contemporary binding in full leather, richly decorated in gold. Spine with 6 nerves, with title and decorations incised in gold. Frontispiece depicting “two graceful and noble chargers” and a portrait of the author, both copper engravings; title page untouched, adorned with a large woodcut border.
A copy with white L2 paper correctly numbered 47 on the recto and 48 on the verso. Two leaves of plates between pages 342 and 345, editorially numbered as pages (343-344).
Errata p. (5)-((6) opposite. Pages 12nn. 402; (4).

FULL TITLES & AUTHORS
Pietra paragone de' cavalieri, [.] divided into five books.
In Napoli, Domenico-Antonio Parrino, 1711
Giuseppe D'Alessandro

CONTENTS
In 1711, Giuseppe D'Alessandro published in Naples Pietra paragone de' cavalieri, a composed work that includes sonnets, letters and treatises of various kinds. The idolized image of the horse, center of a singular equestrian microcosm, constitutes the coordinating element of the collection, which alternates to amorous sonnets and philosophically inspired verses, rhymes praising the glories and virtues of noble quadrupeds, treatises on how to care for their “infirmities,” and even engravings of the marks of the most precious breeds in the Kingdom of Naples. In the vivid bestiary of Baroque lyric poetry, the horse represents a constant pole of attraction, from the sonnets of Marino, Preti, Fontanella, Bruni to the late canzoniere of D'Alessandro, who welcomes and proposes poetic modules and themes of a taste close to the end.

The author belongs to the band of followers of Marinism, who pursue to extreme consequences the poetics of the bizarre, the extravagant, the peregrine, exaggerating tones and situations of early Baroque. He does not limit himself to admiring the rapid and fiery sprint of the “flying coursier” (cf. Ad un cavallo), but also writes odes and hymns to the saddle, the stirrup, the spur. Attracted especially by the animal’s dynamic, impetuous and prancing, he pairs conventional metaphors of the “wind threaded with hair” type with the bold contrast “grounded flyer” (cf. Ad un velocissimo e nobile cavallo) to depict the unstoppable momentum of the running horse.

Moreover, in keeping with late Baroque taste, is the emphatic assertion D'Alessandro makes toward the end of the sonnet to the beloved horse: “For you the sheets acquire honor” and the extensive concluding metaphor: “Your back is nothing more than a throne / For crowned heroes and demigods.” Alongside compositions inspired by incredible equestrian nurturance, there are some amorous sonnets that vary the usual themes of seventeenth-century erotic lyric with a celebratory series of a beautiful woman on a horse, a horse restrained by a beautiful woman, and similar scenes, but they present banal wordplay: “Moro per donna mora” (cf. For a dark-haired woman) in which the elaborate locutions of conceptual poetry are reduced to stereotyped formulas.

Giuseppe D'Alessandro was born in 1656 in Pescolanciano (Province of Campobasso), in “citeriore Aprutio,” to Duke Fabio and Isabella Amendola. Following the premature death of his brother, he became the third duke and seventh baron of the feudal estates of Pescolanciano, Carovilli, Castiglione, Pietrabbondante, Civitanova, Civitavecchia. To these dominions were added the towns of Roccaraso, Castelguidice and Roccacinquemila, brought as a dowry by D.’s wife, the baroness A. M. Marchesani, of Salernitan origin.