Theodoreti episcopi Cyri Eranistes seu Polymorphus, in quo tribus dialogis contra quosdam sui temporis haereticos acerrime & subtilissime disputat. Eiusdem, Hereticorum improbarum nugarum ac fabularum compendium. Eiusdem, Divinorum decretorum seu dogmatum epitome. Quae omnia nunc primum in lucem exeunt, à Gentiano Herueto Aurelio latine versa

8vo (154x103 mm). 255 [i.e. 251], [1 blank] leaves. Collation: a-s⁸ t⁴ u-ii⁸. Leaf ii8 is a blank. Leaves 173-176 omitted in numbering. Roman and italic types. Woodcut historiated initials. Contemporary limp vellum with overlapping edges, inked title on spine (traces of ties). On a front flyleaf 18^th-century bookplate “Lucas Fanti Sac. Theo. Doct. Primus Presbyter Ecclesiae Venetae S. Mariae Jubenicorum D.D. orate pro me”. On the title page manuscript initials “CR” and, below, three ownership entries “I. Bapt. Modij Severini”, “nunc Curtij franchi et.”, and “nuper Domini Rubej”. Several contemporary manuscript annotations and reading signs. Marginal repair to l. g8 with small loss of text, otherwise a very good, crisp and genuine copy.

Provenance. The volume originally belonged to the Calabrian physician and humanist Giovanni Battista Modio (d. 1560). The marginal annotations scattered throughout the volume are in all likelihood mostly in his hand.

Modio was born in Santa Severina, Calabria, on an unknown date in the early 16^th century. A scholar well-versed in Latin and Greek and a physician by profession, he was educated at the Archiginnasio in Naples before moving to Rome, where he became a student of Francesco Fusconi (d. 1553), the personal physician to Adrian VI, Clement VII, and Paul III. Having entered into contact with the academic circles led by F.M. Molza and C. Tolomei, he published the dialogue Il convito overo del peso della moglie in 1554. Around 1555, Modio met Filippo Neri and joined the ranks of his first disciples. He then devoted himself zealously to the spiritual care of patients in the city's hospitals. In 1556, with a dedication to Ranuccio Farnese, he published in Rome the treatise titled Il Tevere, while in 1558 he edited an edition of I Cantici by Jacopone da Todi. He died in Rome in September 1560 cf. G. Cassiani, Modio, Giovanni Battista, in: “Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani”, vol. 75, Rome, 2011, s.v.).

First Latin edition of Theodoretus' treatise Contra haereses, also known as Eranistes (‘The Beggar'), in the translation by Gentian Hervé, which was reprinted a year later in Basel by J. Oporinus. The original Greek text had appeared in Rome in 1547 at Stefano Nicolini da Sabbio's press.

Theodoret of Cyrus was a prominent theologian of the Antiochene School, a prolific biblical commentator, and the Bishop of Cyrrhus in northern Syria (423-458). He played a crucial, mediatory role in the 5^th-century Christological controversies involving Nestorius of Constantinople and Cyril of Alexandria.

Divided in three dialogues, the Eranistes describes Theodoret's opponents, principally the Eutychians, as beggars passing off their doctrines gathered by scraps from diverse heretical sources, and Teodoret himself as the orthodox defender. The work is interspersed with lengthy citations from several patristic sources.

Edit 16, CNCE39266; USTC, 858945; Hoffmann, III, p. 498.

[15970]