[2 Opere] S. Razzi/Ciceronis - Istoria de gli Huomini Illustri / Consolatio - 1583-1596

Two Works of the Sixteenth Century in First Edition

Serafino Razzi, Istoria de gli huomini illustri, così nelle prelature come nelle dottrine, del sacro ordine de gli Predicatori. Lucca, per Vincentio Busdraghi, 1596.
Pp. (16), 381, (3).
[Unitamente a] Marco Tullio Cicerone (pseudepigrafo), M. Tullii Ciceronis Consolatio, vel De luctu minuendo. Fragmenta eius a Carolo Sigonio, & Andrea Patritio exposita. Antonij Riccoboni iudicium, quo illam Ciceronis non esse ostendit. Caroli Sigonij pro eadem orationes II. Bologna, apud Ioannem Rossium, 1583.
Pp. (4), 252, (4).

Formato in-8° (cm 15 × 10,5). Completi. Legatura posteriore, dorso a nervi con fregi dorati e titolo in oro «Uomini Illustri Predicatori».

Two rare and important original editions of the late sixteenth century, bound together in a single volume.

The first is the original edition of the work by the Dominican Serafino Razzi (1531-1613), a valuable collection of biographies of the illustrious men of the Order of Preachers (popes, cardinals, bishops, theologians and doctors), based on archival sources and convent tradition. A work of great interest for the history of the Dominican Order and for ecclesiastical biography.

The second is the Bologna edition of 1583 of the famous Consolatio attributed to Cicero (in reality a celebrated Renaissance apocryphon), edited and defended by Carlo Sigonio, with the fragments, the critical judgment of Antonio Riccoboni and the two defense orations by Sigonio himself. It is one of the best known and most discussed “rediscoveries” of the sixteenth century, at the center of a lively contemporary philological polemic.

A complete copy of the two works, both in first edition (or an extremely early and foundational edition for the Consolatio).

Condition: with some signs of handling to the initial guards, tear at page 115, scattered foxing and some stains and spotting; corners of the front board damaged; title pages restored at the corners (as per photo). Overall a good copy, solid and legible.