Copiae cornu sive oceanus enarrationum Homericarum, ex Eustathii commentariis, Hadriano Junio autore. Basel, H, Froben & N. Episcopius,

£7,500 · Offered by Maggs Bros Ltd

The handsome first edition, the Chatsworth copy, of Hadrianus Junius’ abridgement of Eustathius’ massive commentary on Homer; inscribed to and possibly annotated by ‘internationally famous polyglot poet, scholar, diplomat’, and dedicated proponent of women’s education, Karel Utenhove the younger (1536-1600). The inscription on the title page, dated 1591, indicates that the volume was a gift to Utenhove from German physician, and professor at the University of Cologne Heinrich Botter(1568-1612), whose Commentariolus Parallelos Utenhove would write the preface for, several years later. Utenhove also composed verse for the birth of Botter’s daughter Elizabeth, probably in the 1590s; this volume is perhaps a quid pro quo. By the time of this inscription Utenhove had settled in Cologne, but his long career as a tutor, poet and diplomat in the decades prior had seen the Flemish scholar travel from his home town in Ghent, to France – as a tutor to the three daughters of French intellectual and cultural patron Jean de Morel – and to England, where his students included Mildred Cecil , wife of William Cecil, Lord Burghley (his patron) and where he was known to Elizabeth I as ‘a rare young man for his learning universally, and especially for his singular knowledge in the Greek tongue’ (letter dated 7 February 1562, quoted in van Dorsten, pp. 6-7, from SP 70/35 no. 660). ‘A genial man, with a gift for friendship nearly as remarkable as his gift for languages, [his] acquaintance included

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