DE PERFECTO MUNDI CONTEMPTU OPUSCULUM

Lyon: Thibaud Payen, 1561. 122 x 78 mm. (4 3/4 x 3"). 567, [1] pp.
CONTEMPORARY ROMAN RED MOROCCO, GILT, BY MARCANTONIO GUILLERY, covers with gilt strapwork frame accented with six-pointed stars, palmette and volute cornerpieces, central panel of upper cover with Jesuit IHS monogram within an oval laurel wreath, surrounded by swirling foliage linked with knots, lower cover with similar foliage and with author's name at center, four small holes for now-lacking ties, raised bands, edges gilt and gauffered in a knotwork pattern (old repairs to top panel of spine and reinforcement to corners). Printer's device on title page. Title page with early ink inscription "Antonij Ranutij et amicorum"; rear flyleaf with additional signatures and notes in Latin. Baudrier IV, 283; USTC 153089. For the binding: G. D. Hobson "Maioli, Canevari and Others," p. 116, p. 127 #28, and plate 57; Anthony Hobson, "Apollo and Pegasus Bindings, p. 89, #13; Sotheby's, "Continental Books," 26 April 1990, lot 112 (G. D. Hobson's copy of Valerius Flaccus in a Guillery binding). Front cover with four thin cuts, binding with minimal wear elsewhere, a couple of small ink stains to fore edge, one quire just slightly proud, title page a little soiled, frayed, and with old marginal repair, minor to moderate browning and foxing throughout, final signature with thin dampstain to fore edge. Not without condition issues, but with nothing approaching a fatal defect, the binding (which is the key thing) entirely solid and retaining its antique appeal.

This pleasing pocket edition of a book by a prolific Flemish theologian and ascetic comes in a charming binding with tools that can be traced to the best of the famed Apollo & Pegasus bookbinders. Living from 1402-72, the author variously known as Dionysius Carthusianus (Denis the Carthusian), Denys van Leeuwen, Denis Ryckel, and Dionysius van Rijkel (the latter two for his home village in present-day Belgium), was a Roman Catholic monk and mystic. A voracious learner from birth, he graduated with a Master of Arts degree from the University of Cologne before entering the Carthusian monastery at Roermond. Devoting long hours to study, he produced complete commentaries on the Old and New Testaments, as well as on the major theological writers, leading Pope Eugene IV to proclaim, "Let Mother Church rejoice to have such a son!" Part of a series of treatises intended to help both clergy and the laity live a holy life, the present "A Short Treatise on Perfecting Contempt for the World" comprises seven meditations on sin, salvation, faith, and other related topics, emphasizing the vanity of worldly things and the importance of abstaining from these distractions. Our binding bears a marked resemblance to the Lyon edition of Valerius Flaccus belonging to bindings expert G. D. Hobson and pictured in plate 57 of his "Maioli, Canevari and Others." The overall composition is the same, and there are several identical tools: the central "IHS" monogram within a wreath, the inner foliate volutes and knots, the dolphin cornerpieces, and the small six-pointed stars. In his definitive work on the Apollo & Pegasus bindings, Hobson's son Anthony identified the binder of that volume as Marcantonio Guillery (fl. 1544-65), who was active in Rome as a printer, bookseller, and binder from the 1520s through at least the 1560s. Of the 150 or so extant Apollo & Pegasus bindings done for the library of G. B. Grimaldi, 71 were executed by Guillery, considered by Hobson the most talented of the artisans employed in that endeavor. This work is uncommonly seen on the market in agreeable condition, and a copy like the present one, in a very good period binding from a major workshop, is something of a prize..