Albertini, Francesco:

$9,500 · Offered by William Reese Company · No longer available

OPUSCULUM DE MIRABILIS NOVAE ET VETERIS URBIS ROMAE. From the collection of R. David Parsons. First edition of the topography of both ancient and modern Rome, containing an important and very early reference to Amerigo Vespucci and his New World discoveries in the section "De laudibus civitatum Florentiae & Saonensis." The author places Vespucci near the end of a long line of poets, popes, potentates, and other noteworthy Florentines dating back to the Roman Empire, and names him as the first to discover "novas insulas & loca incognita" on behalf of the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs.The work was compiled for Cardinal Galleotto delle Rovere, nephew of Pope Julius II, who requested that the Florentine humanist, Albertini, write an accurate and up-to-date guide to the city of Rome. This was intended to replace the Mirabilia Romae Urbis, a guidebook first produced in the 12th century in response to the demand from pilgrims for an historical and artistic itinerary to the city. In responding to the Cardinal's request, Albertini's handbook contains descriptions of ancient ruins and later buildings including religious, secular, and pagan sites. Notably the Renaissance guide includes the first printed reference to Michelangelo's ceiling in the Sistine Chapel.The small black inkstamp on the titlepage of this copy belongs the prominent Albani family from Urbino, whose ranks included the collector and cardinal Alessandro Albani, as well as Giovanni Francesco Albani, later Pope Clement

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