Cesare - Quae Extant Omnia - 1737

BRITANNIA AMID STORY, PROPAGANDA, AND MYTH: CAESAR ILLUSTRATED, IN THE SIGN OF THE EMPIRE
This elegant Venetian edition of 1737 of Caesar’s works represents one of the most refined moments in the eighteenth‑century reception of the classical text, where erudition, iconographic apparatus, and editorial ambition fuse into a high‑level product. The presence of engraved plates, such as the image depicting Roman Britain with ethnographic figures, visually translates Caesar’s narrative, transforming the historical text into a nearly theatrical and symbolic narration of Roman dominion. The Latin‑Italian bilingual edition, curated by Francesco Baldelli, reflects a didactic and popularizing intention typical of Venetian Enlightenment, yet it also preserves a strong celebratory emphasis of Roman imperial power, filtered through the late Baroque aesthetic of engraving.
MARKET VALUE
Complete copies of this Venetian edition of 1737, with engraved plates and in good condition, generally fetch between 700 and 1,000 euros, with higher prices for particularly fresh specimens, with intact bindings and well‑preserved contemporary bindings.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION AND CONDITION
Contemporary binding in middle calf, blond with corners, gold title on spine label. Copper‑engraved frontispiece with a portrait of Caesar, title page in red and black with a vignette, 5 plates bound out of text (some folding), numerous engraved figures in the text. Pages with some browning and staining. In old books, with a long history, some imperfections may be present, not always noted in the description. Pp. (2); 2nn; 686; 2nn; 40; (2).

FULL TITLE AND AUTHOR
Quae Extant Omnia, Italic version.
Venice, Albrizzi, 1737.
Gaius Julius Caesar.

CONTEXT AND SIGNIFICANCE
This edition sits within the long editorial tradition of Caesar’s works, which from the Roman princeps of the 15th century traverses Humanism and reaches the 18th century as a foundational text of European historical and political culture. The value of this Venetian print lies not only in the typographic quality of the Albrizzi workshop, but above all in its iconographic apparatus, which translates the story of the conquest of Gaul and Britain into images. The plate presented here, dedicated to Roman Britain, is particularly significant: it combines cartography, ethnography, and the symbolic construction of otherness. The figures of the Britons—druids, warriors, and painted women—embody a view that is both anthropological and propagandistic, in which the barbarian world is ordered and made legible through the Roman gaze. The image is not mere illustration, but a tool of historical and ideological interpretation: Caesar thus becomes not only author, but director of an imperial imaginary that traverses the centuries.

BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
Gaius Julius Caesar (100 B.C.–44 B.C.) was a Roman general, statesman, and writer, a central figure in the transformation of the Republic into an Empire. His works, particularly the Commentarii de bello Gallico and de bello Civili, exemplify a model of Latin prose for clarity and rigor, but also instruments of political propaganda aimed at legitimizing his military campaigns and his personal power.

PRINTING HISTORY AND CIRCULATION
Caesar’s works have been among the most frequently printed classical texts since the invention of printing. Bilingual editions with vernacular translations spread especially between the 17th and 18th centuries, addressing a broader and less specialized audience. The Albrizzi edition of 1737 stands out for the quality of the engravings and for the didactic layout of the facing text, situating itself in the lively Venetian production of the time, which combined humanistic tradition and illustrative taste.

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REFERENCES
EDIT16 (for sixteenth‑century Caesarian tradition, typological comparison);
ICCU / OPAC SBN: records for Venetian editions of Caesar in the eighteenth century (search for Albrizzi, 1737);
Brunet, Manuel du libraire, II, col. 482-486 (entries on Caesar and major editions);
Graesse, Trésor de livres rares, II, p. 58;
Adams, Catalogue of Books Printed on the Continent, C-432 (for editorial Caesarian tradition);
British Library Catalogue, records for illustrated eighteenth‑century editions of Caesar;
USTC (Universal Short Title Catalogue), comparative data on European editions of the eighteenth century.