Bookbinding, Mahieu Aesop Binder, 1492

DIOGENES CYNICUS (PSEUDO). Diogenis Epistole Bruti Yppocratis medici. "Florence … 1487." [Venice: Christophorus de Pensis?, Thomas de Piasiis?, 1492] Second edition of this collection of Hellenistic pseudepigrapha (Diogenes, Brutus, and Hippocrates), translated by Francesco Griffolini and Rinucius Aretinus, and including their original dedications to popes Nicholas V (1447–1455) and Pius II (1456–1464).

The Greek originals were included in Aldo’s Epistolae diversorum philosophorum, 1499 (Goff E-64). This Venice printing counts as a piracy, for it copies the colophon of the first, Florence edition: “Florentiae ... Per Antonium Francisci Venetum. Anno Domini M. CCCC LXXXVII. X. kalend. Iulias.” The workshop known as “Mahieu’s Aesop Binder” was founded at the beginning of the 1550s and was still in operation as late as 1567. It takes its name from a copy of Aesop (Basel, 1501) bound for Thomas Mahieu (Chicago, Newberry Library), one of some fifteen bindings it produced for that bibliophile.

Jean Grolier commissioned four bindings from the shop; the other three are: § Albertus Magnus, Postillatio in Apocalypsim (Basel, 1506) [Austin 12.1]: New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, 019351. Howard Nixon, Sixteenth-Century Gold-Tooled Bookbindings in the Pierpont Morgan Library (New York, 1971), no. 31. § Johannes Lichtenberger, Prognosticatio (Cologne, 1526) [Austin 271]: New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, 017283.

Nixon, op. cit., p. 118; Nixon, “Foreign Bookbindings: The Mahieu Aesop Binder for Grolier, c. 1555” in The Book Collector 20 (1971) p. 353. § Pandolfo Collenuccio, Apologi IIII (Rome, 1526) [Austin 372]: Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Res-Z-1992. Fabienne Le Bars, Jean Grolier à la Bibliothèque nationale de France: 50 reliures de la Réserve des livres rares (Paris, 2012), no. 45. On all four bindings Grolier’s name is abbreviated to “IO GR ET AMICORUM”, with dots before and after each word. 4to (207 x 144 mm). Roman type 1:108R, 30 lines. Collation: AA–FF⁸ GG⁶: 54 leaves. 2- and 3-line initial spaces with printed guide-letters.

Binding: Mid-sixteenth-century Parisian tan calf over pasteboards (210 x 149 mm) by the Mahieu Aesop Binder for Jean Grolier, azured and open tools, author’s name and title lettered at center of upper cover, Grolier’s name .IO . GR . ET. AMICORUM at foot of upper cover and his motto in center of lower cover, spine with 4 full bands, compartments with gilt fleuron, edges gilt. extremities very lightly rubbed.) Brown cloth folding-box.