Vitae Parallelae (Lives of Illustrious Greeks and Romans), in Latin

Plutarch, Vitae Parallelae (Lives of Illustrious Greeks and Romans), in Latin. Pr. Nicholas Jenson, Venice, 2 Jan. 1478. Plutarch’s Lives, originally in Greek, were translated individually or in groups by several Italian scholars between c. 1440 and 1460. The first printed edition of the complete collection was produced in Rome in 1470: V. R. Giustiniani, ‘Traduzioni latine delle “Vite” di Plutarco nel Quattrocento’, Rinascimento, 2nd ser. 3 (1961), 3-62, at 44. Our copy is a reprint of the first edition, and is noteworthy because the printer, Nicholas Jenson, used a particularly elegant ‘roman’ typeface instead of the ‘gothic’ which had been inherited from manuscripts. Accordingly to an advertisement from 1482, his books ‘Do not hinder one’s eyes, but rather help them and do them good. Moreover, the characters are so intelligently and carefully elaborated that the letters are neither smaller, larger nor thicker than reason or pleasure demand.’ At the foot of fo. a2, 17th- or 18th-cent., ‘Pertinet ad Bibliotecam S. Francisci Nouar.’ (i.e. from the Library of the Franciscans of Novara). From the Library of Christ College. Uncatalogued