Opere dell'abate Saverio Bettinelli.

Venice: Antonio Zatta, 1780-1782. Very Good. Octavo (23 cm); 8 volumes. Engraved portrait. In publisher's wraps of woodblock-printed pastepaper of peach-red and white designs. Untrimmed, in original, unsophisticated state. Old printed ex-libris (of Antonio di Cento) at base of title page, along with di Cento's ownership inscription recording the occasion of receiving the set as a gift, dated 1802. Early 20th century bookseller's ticket in volume 1. Light stains in first gathering of volume 1. References: Gamba 2157 ("edizione decorosa"); Brunet, I, 833. Graesse, I, p. 355; Morazzoni, p. 216.

Audacious as it may seem to publish an author's "works" when that author lived another 26 years, this collection includes the bases of Bettinelli's lasting fame: the "lettere virgiliane," in which Virgil recants his devotion to Dante and marks Petrarch as elegant, but repetitive (and what admirer of Petrarch can say he is wrong?); the searing "lettere inglesi" that Bettinelli contributed to "Il Caffè," the magazine that drove the Italian enlightenment; the proto-Romantic essay on aesthetics, "Dell'entusiasmo;" the "tragedies acre," and the social and historical essays contained in "Il risorgimento d'Italia.