Lot 95
Bizari, Pietro
Rare Books, Manuscripts & Photographs
Auction: 16 January 2008 at 11:00 GMT
Description
Rerum Persicarum historia ... tempora complectens. Frankfurt: typis Wychelianis apud Claudium Marnium, & heredes Ionannis Aubrii, 1601, folio, printer's pegasus device on title-page, repeated on verso of last, woodcut initials and decorations, contemporary vellum, four compartments on spine, one slightly damaged, gilt title on second from top, title lettered in Gothic on lower edge, early shelfmark annotations on front pastedown and fly, title in contemporary ms. on lower fore-edge, early armorial stamp of a Cardinal on title-page, heavily browned or oxidised throughout.
Footnote
Note: Second and enlarged edition, first printed in 1583, of this rich compendium of texts dealing with the history of Persia. The volume opens with Pietro Bizari's treatise in twelve books on Persian people, costumes, institutions, home and foreign policy.
Next is a brief excerpt from Photius' summary of Clesias' history of Persia, and a chronological list of the Persian kings. This is followed by Henricus Porsius' narration of the war between the Turkish king Mvrathem (Murad) III and the Persian king.
Mehemetem; an oration to Innocetium VIII on the Turkish war and a history of the Venetian wars against the Turks, both written by Philippus Challimacus, Italian historian of the 15th century; a description of Josephus Barbarus' and Ambrosius Contarenus' travels to Persia; Thoma Minadous' account in nine books of the Turkish-Persian war followed by a short alphabetical list of 'barbarian and new' terms and last, an anonymous description of the Persian war up to the year 1588. All these were originally written in Italian, and appear here translated by Jacobus Gevderus.
BM STC of 17th century German Books, B150; Brunet I p. 955