BOOK DESCRIPTION: the best known and most widely read medieval work on veterinary science for horses. In Italian, manuscript on paper, Italy (Pavia?), c. 1530-1560. Dimensions: 360 x 250 mm.,52 folios on paper, complete, written in an Italic script (cancelleresca italica) in brown ink, red rubrics, decorated 5-line initial on f. 1 styled as a tree trunk and 2- to 3-line red pen initials at the beginning of each chapter. CONTEMPORARY VELLUM BINDING, title written on the spine, enclosed in a modern half calf cover within a half calf slipcase, both with marbled sides. TEXT: Lorenzo Rusio's state-of-the-art treatise on veterinary science for horses is the best known and most widely read medieval work on the subject. It appears here in a rare fifteenth-century Italian translation, known only in four other manuscripts. Its large size and long lines suggest a reference copy, not something suitable for practical use in the stables. The text adds forty chapters on the preparation and application of medicines for horses, and a table of Latin and vernacular names for plants and herbs. PROVENANCE: Written in northern Italy in the middle of the sixteenth century, c. 1530-1560; Private European Collection; Belonged to Johan Dejager who assembled a collection of over 350 books related to horsemanship (no. 8 in his catalogue). CONDITION: overall in good condition. [TM 1027]
(Inventory #: TM 1027)
(773) 929-5986
