Ovid. Epistolas Ouidii: Cum commentariis Ubertini: Et epistolas Sabini poetae singularis: Ac epistolam Sapphos: Cum Domitio: Et opusculu[m] in Ibin: Cum [c]omentario eiusdem Domitii: singula peroptime castigata lector candidissime hic inuenies, collation: A-P⁶ Q⁴, 94 ff., 56 lines, Roman type, woodcut initials, title lightly foxed, repairs to inner margins of A1&2, some early ink annotations in different hands, some water-staining to margins, one or two short marginal tears, scattered light soiling, eighteenth century red half morocco, spine gilt in compartments with floral motif, some small wormholes to spine, strips of fading to covers and spine, spine ends and corners slightly rubbed, 4to (295 x 195mm), Bologna, Caligola Bazalieri, 1501.

*** This edition of the Heroides is unknown to all bibliographies and unrecorded in any institution. It is rare to come across any of Caligola Bazalieri’s editions: seventeen of the forty-two books that he published are known only as single copies or are “ghost” volumes, only known through bibliographies. This edition is based on the version published in July 1491 by his brother, Bazaliero Bazalieri, at whose press Caligola began his career. The text itself is Ovid’s Heroides, a collection of imaginary letters written from ancient mythological heroines to the lovers who abandoned or mistreated them, including Penelope, Dido, Ariadne, Phaedra, Medea, and Sappho.

Literature: not in Adams; c.f. Edit16 CNCE 41015 (Venice, Varisio)

Provenance: the library of Giacomo Filippo Durazzo, a Genoese nobleman (pencil inscription to front pastedown)