Bardetti - Primi Abitatori dell’Italia - 1769

ALL ORIGINS OF ITALY: THE LIGURIANS, THE UMBRI, THE ETRUSCANS AND THE PEOPLES BEFORE ROME
ABSTRACT
First edition of the important posthumous work by Stanislao Bardetti dedicated to the origin and identification of the oldest peoples of the Italian peninsula. Published in Modena in 1769, the work brings together in two parts a wide inquiry into migrations, ancient traditions, and the testimonies of classical authors. Bardetti discusses Ligurians, Umbri, Taurisci, Sicani, Siculi, Aborigines, Etruscans, Aurunci and numerous other populations in an attempt to reconstruct the most remote ethnic history of Italy. The edition is embellished by the portrait of the author in the frontispiece, the allegorical table dedicated to Carlo Firmian, and the cartographic vignette of Italy at the head of the title page.

WHY TO BUY
FIRST EDITION – Original edition of 1769, published posthumously two years after Bardetti’s death and fundamental for the eighteenth-century history of studies on the pre-Roman peoples of Italy.
ITALY BEFORE ROME – A vast attempt to reconstruct the origins of Ligurians, Umbri, Taurisci, Sicani, Siculi, Aborigines, Etruscans and Aurunci through the systematic comparison of the testimonies of Greek and Latin authors.
RICH ICONOGRAPHIC APPARATUS – Engraved portrait of Stanislao Bardetti in the frontispiece, second engraved plate with a medallion of Carlo Firmian and an allegorical figure, vignette of Italy at the title page, large engraved head, drop caps and final initials. The institutional collation confirms two textless plates.
TWO PARTS IN ONE VOLUME – The entire work, divided into Part One and Part Two but with continuous pagination, is preserved in a single volume in an elegant contemporary binding with a richly gold-tooled spine.

MARKET VALUE
For a complete copy of the first edition of 1769, with both plates outside the text and in a decorative contemporary binding like this, the commercial value is indicatively in the range €650–900.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION AND CONDITION
Contemporary full leather binding with marbled boards, spine with raised bands ornamented in gold with floral motifs, ornaments and a footnote label with title; red edges. Normal wear and abrasions to the binding, more evident to the corners and edges; spine title partly faded. Internally with some foxing and normal browning. Old handwritten possession note on the flyleaf. In ancient books, with a long history, there may be some imperfections not always noted in the description. This listing contains AI Views. Refer to the original photographs to verify the actual condition of the item. Images are part of the description. Pp. (4); 10nn; 472; (2).

FULL TITLE AND AUTHOR
De’ primi abitatori dell’Italia.
In Modena, nella Stamperia di Giovanni Montanari, 1769.
Stanislao Bardetti.

CONTEXT AND SIGNIFICANCE
De’ primi abitatori dell’Italia belongs to the grand eighteenth-century season of antiquarian research into the origins of European peoples. Bardetti attempts to reconstruct the oldest history of the peninsula by combining Greek and Latin sources, genealogical traditions, historical geography, etymology, and critical comparison with modern antiquaries. The index and the final catalog of authors, visible in the copy, show the breadth of the documentary base used.

Bardetti’s thesis identified the so-called “Circompadani” as the first inhabitants of the peninsula and attributed particular antiquity to Ligurians, Umbri, and Taurisci. He considered Ligurians and Umbri of Celtic origin, while attributing Germanic origins to the Taurisci; he also tackled Siculi, Aborigines, Etruscans, Sicani, Aurunci and other peoples of pre-Roman Italy. These reconstructions are now superseded by archaeology, linguistics, and population genetics, but for this reason the work remains a significant document in the birth of modern research into Italy’s ethnic origins.

Particularly interesting is the method: Bardetti argued that historical inquiry should precede linguistic analysis, a position that set him apart from scholars like Scipione Maffei and Alessio Simmaco Mazzocchi, who were more inclined to attribute a preliminary role to linguistic testimonies in reconstructing origins.

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
Stanislao Bardetti was an Italian Jesuit, historian, and antiquarian of the 18th century. Tied to the Modena cultural milieu and a theologian for the Duke of Modena, from 1764 he was director of the Jesuit college in the city. He died in Modena on 6 March 1767, leaving manuscripts of studies to which he had devoted many years on the origins of Italic populations. De’ primi abitatori dell’Italia appeared posthumously in 1769; in 1772 followed, again posthumously, Della lingua de’ primi abitatori dell’Italia.

PRINTING HISTORY AND CIRCULATION
This is the first edition, published posthumously in Modena by Giovanni Montanari in 1769. The work is formally divided into Part One and Part Two, but it presents continuous pagination up to p. 471, followed by the errata. The bibliographic description of the Braidense records [12], 471, [1] pages and two engraved plates.

The preliminary apparatus is of particular interest. Giovanni Montanari dedicated the work to Carlo Giuseppe di Firmian, governor of Austrian Lombardy and an important eighteenth-century patron; the allegorical plate dated 1769 carries his portrait. After this first work, in 1772 Della lingua de’ primi abitatori dell’Italia was published, which developed the linguistic aspect of Bardetti’s research.

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REFERENCES
National Central Library of Brera, historical catalog, De’ primi abitatori dell’Italia, Modena, Giovanni Montanari, 1769: [12], 471, [1] pp., [2] plates, in-4°.
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, entry “Stanislao Bardetti”.
Google Books, digital copies of the first edition, Modena 1769, from the National Library of the Netherlands, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek and New York Public Library.
BNF, Catalogue général, Bardetti, De’ primi abitatori dell’Italia.
SBN / ICCU, Bardetti, Stanislao, De’ primi abitatori dell’Italia, Modena, 1769.
Italian seventeenth- and eighteenth-century bibliographic repertoires and catalogs of antiquarian collections dedicated to the history of pre-Roman Italy.