Lot 739: VIGNOLA, Giacomo Barozzi da (1507-1573) and Ignazio DANTI (1537-1586). Le due regole delle prospettiva pratica . Edited by Danti. Rome: Francesco Zanetti, 1583.

VIGNOLA, Giacomo Barozzi da (1507-1573) and Ignazio DANTI (1537-1586). Le due regole delle prospettiva pratica. Edited by Danti. Rome: Francesco Zanetti, 1583. 2o (348 x 241 mm). Engraved additional titles by, and possibly after, Cherubini Alberto, woodcut head- and tail-pieces, woodcut initials, and woodcut printer's device on colophon (Vaccaro fig. 23). 29 engraved illustrations by Vignola, 8 full-page, and 122 woodcut illustrations, some full-page. (Lacking final blank, pale stain on R1-2.) 18th-century sheep-backed boards (some light wear at extremities). Provenance: acquired from Arthur Freeman, 1971. FIRST EDITION. "THE FIRST PERSPECTIVE BOOK OF IMPORTANCE PRINTED IN ROME and perhaps the earliest in Italy to devote itself entirely to the subject of artificial perspective" (T.K. Kitao, quoted by RIBA). Vignola's Le due regole was probably begun in the 1550s and the drawings were probably finished in 1562 (the date which one of the illustrations bears). However, the work was not published in his lifetime, and the text of this edition is thought to have been established by Vignola and his son Giacinto in 1573, the year of the former's death. The text and the engravings prepared by Vignola were then passed to Ignazio Danti, who edited the work, and wrote an explanation and had the series of illustrative woodcuts prepared, and the work was finally published in 1583, with Vignola's text printed in a larger typeface to distinguish it from Danti's commentary. As Cicognara states, "Questo è il miglior libro, che da noi si conosca per simili instituzioni, e rende conto giustissimo delle migliori opere precedenti ... La prima di queste edizioni è bellissima per la sua nitidezza." In this copy the engraving on G4r is correctly printed. Adams B-249; Cicognara 810; Fowler 386; Mortimer Italian 538; RIBA 3444.

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