De officiis. Paradoxa Stoicorum; Laelius sive de Amicitia; Cato maior, sive de senectute; Somnium Scipionis. Marcus Tullius Cicero. Parma: Stephanus Corallus, 11th January 1477.
-------------------
Cicero’s De Officiis, written just following Julius Caesar’s assassination, offers a Stoic guide to moral duty and practical ethics, especially for statesmen. Paradoxa Stoicorum, as the title implies, presents six Stoic paradoxes, counterintuitive yet reasoned moral truths, framed with Cicero's characteristic rhetorical flair to make philosophical ideals accessible. In Laelius de Amicitia, Cicero explores the nature and value of true friendship through the lens of virtue and mutual respect. Cato Maior, sive de Senectute defends old age as a fruitful and dignified stage of life, using the wise statesman Cato as a mouthpiece. Lastly, Somnium Scipionis, a dream sequence from Cicero’s now lost De Re Publica, presents a vision of the cosmos and the immortality of the soul, blending Stoic cosmology with Roman ideals of duty and legacy. Given all of these works present in this book, this is a fantastic incunable printing of many of Cicero's works, highly desirable, particularly for being so very scarce and from the Parmese press of Stephanus Corallus whose output was quite small.
This Parma edition brings together several of Cicero’s most enduring philosophical works in one remarkable incunable imprint. Printed by Stephanus Corallus, whose press produced only a small number of titles, this edition is of considerable rarity and bibliographic significance. It is one of the rarest early printings of Cicero: only 10 institutional copies are recorded worldwide, with just three outside of Italy (including one in the Vatican). The only known copies beyond the Italian peninsula are held at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and the Newberry Library in Chicago. This is the sole copy we can trace in commerce - a superb survival from an exceptionally scarce press, being particularly significant for some lovely early marginalia.
-------------------
Provenance:
Contemporary marginalia throughout, both interlinear and in the outer margins, alongside several attractively decorated entrance initials. Of particular note are two ink drawings of individuals in 15th–16th-century secular dress, offering rare visual documentation of non-ecclesiastical fashion from the late medieval/early modern period.
Inscription of "Sobastiano Galeotti" to i8 verso, perhaps the Italian peripatetic artist Sebastiano Galeotti (1675-1741) who was active in Parma and other Italian cities.
-------------------
Size: 180 x 252 mm (approx.)
Condition:
[a2-8, b-l8, m7]
Lacks the two blanks else collates as complete (a1, m8). Minor worming in the gutter of gathering e, not affecting text. Paper repair to k7 running through a few lines of text but almost unnoticeably so, no text loss. Some sporadic toning and spotting with areas of discolouration as pictured, but generally clean. Page block slightly trimmed for a historic rebinding. Later blanks bound at each end, no ownership inscriptions, but with an ex-libris stamp to front pastedown from a Parmese collector.
Full limp vellum binding from a circa 16th century Hebrew MS, faded, Hebrew text unidentified, bound later, circa the late 19th century. "M. Tulli Ciceronis" written to upper spine. Both boards securely attached, binding secure. The binding does stand without shelf lean though the boards tend to move outwards owing to the limp vellum nature of the binding, but stands well on the shelf supported by other books.
[GW 6930; ISTC ic00587000; USTC 995788].
