Andalus de Nigro. Opus astrolabii, first and only edition, collation: [1-210], 19 of [20] leaves, lacking final blank leaf, text in single column, 40 lines, type: 1:101G, first page decorated with a five-line vinestem initial 'S', illuminated in red and blue on a silver background with extension in half the margin, 69 three-line initials alternately in red or blue, rubricated throughout, fol. [2]/8v one initial lost and a few words of text retouched in ink, portion of right side of final leaf missing and skilfully laid on an ancient leaf, on right side of text block words of 21 lines neatly supplied in brown ink, water-stain to lower right corner, heavier in last quire, not affecting the text apart from final two leaves, some other water-stains or spots, old repairs to penultimate leaf, 18th-century speckled boards, possibly recased, a tall copy, small folio (281 x 218 mm.), Ferrara, Johann Picardus, de Hamell, 1475. ⁂ One of the earliest printed astronomical texts, and one of the rarest scientific incunables issued in Ferrara. Only ten copies of this edition are recorded in institutional libraries (four in Italy and two in the United States). The famous astronomer and traveller from Genoa, Andalo de Nigro, succeeded Cecco d'Ascoli to the chair in Florence and, in about 1330, became Giovanni Boccaccio's teacher. Geoffrey Chaucer (who, some seventy years later, wrote the first work in English on a scientific instrument - the Treatise on the Astrolabe - and was inspired by Boccaccio for his Canterbury Tales) may have known Andalo's Opus astrolabii through either the Genealogiae Deorum, which first appeared in 1472 or the De casibus virorum illustrium, printed in 1474-1475. In the latter, Boccaccio calls Andalo a 'venerable' man, and compliments him on his vast knowledge of the stars, gained 'by direct vision' during his travels around the world. In 1314 Andalo had been appointed ambassador to the Emperor of Trebisonda (Trabzon), and Giovanni Battista Ramusio, in his preface to the Viaggi di Messer Marco Polo (which opens the second volume of his Navigationi et viaggi of 1559), identified Andalo, not the Pisan Rustichello, as the prisoner to whom Marco Polo had dictated his memoirs. The Opus astrolabii was edited by the physician and astrologer Pietro Bono Avogario (d. 1506) who was active, as the colophon states, 'in foelici gymnasio ferrariensi', and it was printed by the Frenchman Jean Picard de Hamell who "is not known to have issued at Ferrara any book besides the Nigro" (BMC vi, 608). Literature: HR 967; BMC vi, 608; IGI 456; Goff A-573; Lalande 12; Sarton iii, 647; Stillwell, Awakening, 808; Thorndike iv 465; A. M. Cesari, "Theorica planetarum di Andalò Di Negro. Questioni di astronomia. Indagine delle fonti astronomiche nelle opere del Boccaccio. Edizione critica", Physis, 27 (1985), pp. 181-235; D. Blume, "Andalo di Negro und Giovanni Boccaccio Astrologue und Mythos am Hof des Robert von Anjou", T. Michalsky (ed.), Medien der Macht. Kunst der Anjous in Italien, Berlin 2001, pp. 319-335.
Andalus de Nigro. Opus astrolabii, first and only edition, collation: [1-210], 19 of [20] leaves, lacking final blank leaf, text in single column, 40 lines, type: 1:101G, first page decorated with a five-line vinestem initial 'S', illuminated in red and blue on a silver background with extension in half the margin, 69 three-line initials alternately in red or blue, rubricated throughout, fol. [2]/8v one initial lost and a few words of text retouched in ink, portion of right side of final leaf missing and skilfully laid on an ancient leaf, on right side of text block words of 21 lines neatly supplied in brown ink, water-stain to lower right corner, heavier in last quire, not affecting the text apart from final two leaves, some other water-stains or spots, old repairs to penultimate leaf, 18th-century speckled boards, possibly recased, a tall copy, small folio (281 x 218 mm.), Ferrara, Johann Picardus, de Hamell, 1475. ⁂ One of the earliest printed astronomical texts, and one of the rarest scientific incunables issued in Ferrara. Only ten copies of this edition are recorded in institutional libraries (four in Italy and two in the United States). The famous astronomer and traveller from Genoa, Andalo de Nigro, succeeded Cecco d'Ascoli to the chair in Florence and, in about 1330, became Giovanni Boccaccio's teacher. Geoffrey Chaucer (who, some seventy years later, wrote the first work in English on a scientific instrument - the Treatise on the Astrolabe - and was inspired by Boccaccio for his Canterbury Tales) may have known Andalo's Opus astrolabii through either the Genealogiae Deorum, which first appeared in 1472 or the De casibus virorum illustrium, printed in 1474-1475. In the latter, Boccaccio calls Andalo a 'venerable' man, and compliments him on his vast knowledge of the stars, gained 'by direct vision' during his travels around the world. In 1314 Andalo had been appointed ambassador to the Emperor of Trebisonda (Trabzon), and Giovanni Battista Ramusio, in his preface to the Viaggi di Messer Marco Polo (which opens the second volume of his Navigationi et viaggi of 1559), identified Andalo, not the Pisan Rustichello, as the prisoner to whom Marco Polo had dictated his memoirs. The Opus astrolabii was edited by the physician and astrologer Pietro Bono Avogario (d. 1506) who was active, as the colophon states, 'in foelici gymnasio ferrariensi', and it was printed by the Frenchman Jean Picard de Hamell who "is not known to have issued at Ferrara any book besides the Nigro" (BMC vi, 608). Literature: HR 967; BMC vi, 608; IGI 456; Goff A-573; Lalande 12; Sarton iii, 647; Stillwell, Awakening, 808; Thorndike iv 465; A. M. Cesari, "Theorica planetarum di Andalò Di Negro. Questioni di astronomia. Indagine delle fonti astronomiche nelle opere del Boccaccio. Edizione critica", Physis, 27 (1985), pp. 181-235; D. Blume, "Andalo di Negro und Giovanni Boccaccio Astrologue und Mythos am Hof des Robert von Anjou", T. Michalsky (ed.), Medien der Macht. Kunst der Anjous in Italien, Berlin 2001, pp. 319-335.
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