Cato (Marcus Porcius) Varro, Columella & Palladius. Libri de re rustica, first Badius edition, collation: Aa⁶, A⁸, B⁶, a-t⁸, v⁶, x⁸, Roman type, title within elaborate woodcut architectural border, large printer's device of a press at centre, woodcut decorated initials, some criblé, numerous woodcut illustrations and diagrams in text, small wormholes to lower portion of front gutter, title lightly soiled with old repair to outer lower blank corner, without loss, a few leaves uniformly browned, some small stains and spots, handsome contemporary brown morocco over pasteboards, covers within blind fillets and two frames richly blind-tooled in floral patterns, traces of ties at edges, at centre of both covers cornerpieces and fleurons surrounding a quatrefoil-shaped medallion, with gilt inscriptions 'de re rustica' (upper cover), and 'm: cat: m: var l: col' (lower cover), spine with three raised bands, compartments blind-tooled with diagonal fillet pattern, edges with trace of original green colouring, minor scuffs to upper cover, upper joint slightly cracked, minor wear to corners and extremities of spine, front flyleaf lacking, folio (333 x 214mm.), Paris, Badius Ascensius, 1529.

⁂ A good, wide-margined and unsophisticated copy of the first Badius edition of this classical collection of texts on agriculture by the major Roman writers on the subject. This edition closely followed the Libri de re rustica published by Aldus Manutius in May 1514, and edited by the Venetian printer himself along with the humanist architect Giovanni Giocondo. Like the Aldine publication, the Parisian edition is thus supplemented with commentary by renowned humanists, such as the Enarrationes vocum priscarum in libris De re rustica by Giorgio Merula, the Enarrationes in XII Columellae libros by Filippo Beroaldo, the Interpretatio in hortum Columellae by Pomponio Leto, and the Scholia in hortum Palladii by Giovanni Battista Pio and Antonio Urceo (Codrus).

Literature: Not in Adams; Renouard Bade, II, pp. 263-264; Schweiger OO, p. 1306.