Catharina Senensis, Libro della divina dottrina, Venice, 1494, contemporary tooled calf

Catharina Senensis

Libro della divina dottrina. Venice: Matteo Capcasa (di Codeca) for Lucantonio Giunta, 17 May 1494

4to (210 x 152mm.), 172 leaves (of 180), AA a–x⁸ y⁴, double column, 38 lines, roman type, a1 with woodcut illustration and woodcut border, woodcut initials, full-page woodcut on x7v, contemporary Venetian calf with tooled knotwork decoration, lacking first quire (AA⁸), last four leaves washed, binding somewhat rubbed and repaired at corners, ends of spine repaired, new endpapers

Catherine of Siena's Dialogo della divina dottrina was first printed in Bologna in around 1475. This is the first illustrated edition, with accompanying texts on the life and death of St Catherine, including several Laude, contemporary praiseworthy accounts of her life which were often designed to be sung. It was also dedicated by the editor, a Dominican friar, to two women, Isabella of Aragon (the wife of the duke of Milan) and Beatrice d'Este.

The two woodcut illustrations show Catherine dictating her words to three scribes (this work was apparently dictated in 1378), and Catherine preaching. Sander opines that the first woodcut is perhaps by the same artist as the woodcuts in Pulci's Cyriffo Calvaneo (see lot 198).

LITERATURE:

ISTC ic00284000; Sander 1816