Sonetti e canzone del preclarissimo poeta messere Antonio Cornazano Placentino. Colophon: Stampata in Venetia per mi Manfrino de Monfera, M.cccccii. adi. IIII Agosto

Autore: CORNAZZANO, Antonio (ca. 1430-1484)

Tipografo: Manfredo Bonelli

Dati tipografici: Venezia, 4 August 1502


8vo (148x95 mm). [64] leaves. Collation: A-H8. Title page in gothic type printed in red within a woodcut border. Colophon at l. H4v. Early 20th-century light brown morocco gilt, marbled endleaves, red edges. Pencil note on the back final endleaf recto “Vincenzi-Modena 7-8-40 370=”. Lower blank margin of the title page cut off and replaced, upper outer corner of several leaves repaired with no loss of text, small tear to the upper margin of the first two leaves with minor loss of blank paper, some light browning and occasional marginal foxing, all in all a good copy.

Extremely rare first edition, first issue (a second issue, which has to be considered as an actual new edition, was printed by Bonelli on 14 December 1502). Bonelli reissued the book also on 10 February 1503 and 30 September 1508. The work was also reprinted in Milan twice, in 1503 and in 1519, with the poems numbered and arranged in a different order.

Between 1472 and 1476, Cornazzano worked on his canzoniere, probably with the intention of publishing it, perhaps prompted by the success of Giusto de' Conti's edition. The project was not completed, however, and it was not until 1502, many years after Cornazzano's death, that Giacomo Filippo Pellenegra edited the first edition of the Sonetti e canzone printed in Venice by Bonelli, adding two of his own compositions to Cornazzano's poems.

The collection contains 178 sonnets and 34 canzoni, to which must be added the two already mentioned compositions by Giacomo Filippo Pellenegra (Jacobus Philippus ex Pellibus Nigris) in the appendix: an epistle in verse sent from Padua to Panfilo Sassi, in which he gives the false news of Sassi's death, and a canzone in imitation of Bembo (‘Amor: quel basso stile in cui raggiono').

Antonio Cornazzano was born around 1429 in Piacenza. He served the Sforza, Colleoni and Estensi families, at whose court he died around 1484. A court and improviser poet, he was one of the most prolific poets of his time: to glorify Francesco Sforza, he wrote the poem the Sforzeide, and put into verse several treatises, including a life of the Virgin (Vita di Nostra Donna, Venice 1471), other lives of illustrious men, and a treatise on military art (Opera bellissima de l'arte militar, Venice 1493). He also edited a collection of proverbs, first published in Venice in 1525 (Proverbi di M. Antonio Cornazzano) (cf. P. Farenga, Cornazzano, Antonio, in: “Dizionario biografico degli Italiani”, vol. 29, Rome, 1983, s.v.).

Edit 16, CNCE13312; Sander, 2188.


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