Lot 124: 

BOCCHI, Achille (1488-1562). Symbolicarum libri quinque. Bologna: Nova Academia Bocchiana (printed for the author), 1555.

4υo (201 x 133 mm.). Woodcut of bull's skull, engraved medallion portrait of Bocchi, 151 large engraved emblems by Giulio Bonasone (ca 1498- ca 1574) after Prospero Fontana (1512-1597) and Parmigianino (1503-1540), two 12-line and one 6-line woodcut initials, ruled in red throughout. (Some occasional light marginal staining, a few leaves with short marginal tears, minor worming to V3-Z3.) Contemporary French vellum, yapp edges, richly gilt, sides decorated in an arabesque design, flat spine richly gilt in five compartments, yapp edges decorated with a gilt roll tool, edges gilt. Provenance: Demallender (early inscription to Seigneur de Greaz Bailly de Caux on title); Charles Tennant (bookplate); Otto Schäfer (small ink stamp at end, his sale Sotheby's New York, 8 December 1994, lot 33).

FIRST EDITION of this celebrated emblem book, probably bound for presentation. Bocchi, an Italian humanist, is considered to be "among the first emblematists" (Praz). Symbolicarum quaestionum "takes as its subject the whole of universal knowledge: physics, metaphysics, theology, dialectic, Love, Life and Death, packaging them under the veil of fables and myths" (John Manning, The Emblem 2002 p.114). This copy with the second setting of quire B, confirming to the style of quire D (see Mortimer and lot 42). Adams B-2194; Brunet I:1021; Heckscher & Sherman, Emblem Books in the Princeton University Library 107; Landwehr Romanic 162; Mortimer Italian 76; Praz p. 276.

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