Lettera, rime, et oratione dell’Arnigio in lode della bellissima e gentilissima signora Ottavia Baiarda

Formato: in quarto

Association copies

 

4to (191x138 mm) 32, [8], 33-43, [1] pp. Collation: A-B⁸, BB⁴, C⁶. Printer's device on the title page and last leaf verso. On the title page is the ownership entry: “Dono di Angelo Sospiri, et dell'Arnig[io] Di Antonio Beffa Neg.[rini]”. The book was gifted by the author and Angelo Sospiri to Antonio Beffa Negrini (Asola, 1532-1602), scholar and judge in Mantua, as well as a member of several academies, who wrote a collection of Rime dedicated to Ludovica Data Tiraboschi which appeared in Venice in 1566. Recently bound in 18^th-century coloured wrappers. Worm hole in upper inner margin of the first 30 leaves, skilfully repaired. A very good copy.

RARE FIRST EDITIONedited by Angelo Sospiri and dedicated by him to Giovan Battista Gavardi. The book includes a letter to Ottavia Baiarda Beccaria, 32 poems (canzoni, sonnets, etc.), and the Encomium Octaviae Baiardae, all by Arnigio. At the end is a sonnet by Adriano Mauro addressed to the author. With this publication Arnigio obtained a reward of two hundred scudi and the esteem of Gavardi, who was a fervent admirer of the praised gentlewoman, Ottavia Camilla Baiardi, from a prominent family of Parma. She was the niece of Francesco Baiardi, one of the main patrons of Parmigianino, and was portrayed by him in the painting known as Antea (cf. G. Bertini, Una proposta identificazione dell' “Antea” del Parmigianino: Ottavia Baiardi Beccaria, in: “Aurea Parma”, LXXX, 2002, pp. 361-368).

Edit 16, CNCE3069; A. Erdmann, My gracious silence, Luzern, 1999, p. 156; BMSTC Italian, p. 56.

(offered together:)

MISCELLANEOUS VOLUME (4to, 191x138 mm, modern gilt vellum), which includes the following six extremely rare works:

ARNIGIO, Bartolomeo (1523-1577). Canzone a l'illustrissimo e reverendiss. monsignore il Cardinal di Gambara. De l'Arnigio. Padua, Grazioso Percacino, 1562.

4to. [4] leaves. Collation: A⁴. Printer's device on the title page. Copy donated by Simone Sospiro to Antonio Beffa Negrini.

A poem dedicated to Gianfrancesco Gambara (1533-1587), who had obtained the cardinal's hat from Pope Pius IV in March 1561.

Edit 16, CNCE3070.

EIUSDEM. Stanze de l'Arnigio al signor Gioan Battista Gavardo. Padua, Grazioso Percacino, 1563.

4to. [8] leaves. Collation: A-B⁴. Leaf B4 is a blank. Donated by the author to Antonio Beffa Negrini. Title page slightly foxed.

Stanzas dedicated to Giovan Battista Gavardo (1522-1564), a philanthropist and man of letters from Brescia, a friend of Arnigio and an admirer of Ottavia Baiardi (cf. G. Caravale, Preaching and Inquisition in Renaissance Italy, Boston, 2016, p. 141).

Edit 16, CNCE3071.

EIUSDEM. Canzone all'Accademia Bresciana, nel suo nascimento. De l'Arnigio. N.pl., n.pr. [probably Brescia, Vincenzo Sabbio], (1564).

4to. [4] leaves. One unsigned quire. Donated by the author to Antonio Beffa Negrini. Recent note on the title page verso.

This poem was written for the foundation, in 1563, of the famous Accademia degli Occulti, of which Arnigio and Beffa Negrini were both members (cf. M. Maylender, Storia delle accademie d'Italia, Bologna, 1926-30, IV, p. 90).

Apparently unrecorded.

[EIUSDEM]. Nelle nozze de l'illustre signor conte Paol'Emilio Martinengo, e la signora Laura Gonzaga. N.pr., n.pl., n.d. [ca. 1560-65].

4to. Broadsheet printed on recto only. With a large woodcut initial. Traces of folding.

Poem written between 1560 and 1566 for the marriage of the Brescian nobleman Paolo Emili Martinengo, lord of Urago, Ozinuovi and Roccafranca, and Laura, daughter of Massimiliano Gonzaga, Marquis of Luzzara.

Apparently unrecorded.

EIUSDEM. Al reverendissimo, et illustrissimo signore il Cardinal di Lorena. N.pr., n.pl., n.d.

4to. Broadsheet printed on recto only. With a large woodcut initial. Traces of folding. With Arnigio's autograph signature at the bottom. Gift of the author.

Poem written to the Cardinal Charles of Lorraine (1524-1574) during the latter's stay at the Council of Trent or his visit to Pope Pius IV (September 1563).

Apparently unrecorded.

EIUSDEM. In morte della S. Lucia… Autograph manuscript poem written on one page (recto) and signed by Arnigio. The title of the poem is not fully readable as it has been partially cut off. Incipit: “Sparita è l'ALBA, di quella viva LUCE…”.

This peom was written by Arnigio for the death of the poetess Lucia Albani Avogadro (1534-1568), a renowned poetess from Brescia, some of whose verses were published by Girolamo Ruscelli in Rime di diversi eccellenti autori bresciani (1553). The poem was also printed in the anthology of the Rime de gli Academici Occulti con le loro imprese et discorsi (Brescia, 1568, p. 99).

The ensuing poem addressed to Jacomo da Montefalco seems to be unrecorded.

Bartolomeo Arnigio, the son of a blacksmith from Brescia, showed an early preference for letters over his father's trade. He graduated in medicine at the University of Padua, thinking that the medical profession would allow him to live decorously and give him time to devote himself to poetry. He turned out to be wrong, since soon after his return to Brescia he was accused of the death of numerous patients and was forced to escape and definitively give up medicine. He returned to Brescia only a few years later, called by Abbot Ascanio Martinengo, who appointed him as reader of philosophy. In Brescia he became a member of the Academia of the Occulti under the name of Solingo. He died of plague in 1577. He is the author of numerous short compositions as well as some more lengthy works such as Le diece veglie de gli ammendati costumi dell'humana vita (Brescia, 1576) and the Dialogo della medicina d'amore (Brescia, 1566) (cf. M. Bianco, Bartolomeo Arnigio, in: “Mille anni di letteratura bresciana”, P. Gibellini & L. A. Biglione di Viarigi, eds., Brescia, 2004, I, pp. 185-90).

Arnigio and Beffa Negrini were friends and belonged to the same group of scholars and poets who gravitated around the Accademia degli Occulti in Brescia. Their names appear together in some collections of poems published around that time.

The two volumes are preserved in a recent cloth case.

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