Athenaeum ligusticum, seu Syllabus scriptorum Ligurum nec non Sarzanensium, ac Cyrnensium reipublicae Genuensis subditorum ab Augustino Oldoino, Societatis Iesu, collectus

THE FIRST BIO-BIBLIOGRAPHY OF CORSICAN WRITERS

4to (203x143 mm). [2], 20, 623, [1 blank] pp. Collation: †⁴ [χ]¹ ††⁴ †††² A-Iiii⁴. Woodcut ornament on title page. Woodcut decorative initials, head- and tail-pieces. Late 19^th-century half vellum, red morocco lettering piece on spine. Small ancient repair to title-page verso, slightly uniformly browned.

First edition, dedicated to Cardinal Giannicolò Conti (1617-1698), archibishop of Ancona. The work opens with an introduction, Nostrae Liguriae delineatio, which traces the territorial boundaries of the region and then establishes the criteria for selecting the authors quoted, who number about one thousand seven hundred. Liguria here is obviously understood to mean the Republic of Genoa, which at the time also included the Sarzana area and the island of Corsica (cf. L. Balsamo, La bibliografia, Florence, 1992, p. 61).

The authors, of each of whom bio-bibliographical information is provided, ara arranged in alphabetical order by first name, but at the end of the volume there is also an index by surname and one by place of origin. On page 137 is a biography of Christopher Columbus, and various are the mentions in the work to the discovery of America.

The present is also the first bio-bibliography of Corsican writers (cf. R. Giardelli, Saggio di una bibliografia generale sulla Corsica, in: “Giornale storico e letterario della Liguria”, Genoa, 1938, p. 106).

Oldoini, a native of La Spezia, entered the Society of Jesus in 1628. He lived and taught for many years in Perugia, where he died in 1683. Among his numerous and important historical-bibliographical works are the Athenaeum Romanum (1676), a bibliography of the writings of popes and cardinals, and the Athenaeum Augustum (1678), concerning the writers from Perugia (cf. A. Neri, Notizie di Agostino Oldoini, storico e bibliografo ligure del secolo XVII, in: “Giornale Ligustico”, II, 1875, pp. 181-196).

C. Frati, Dizionario bio-bibliografico dei bibliotecari e bibliofili italiani, Florence, 1933, pp. 417-418. BMSTCItalian-17th cent., p. 626. De Backer-Sommervogel, V, 1880-1881. Bibl. Vinciana, 3611. Lozzi, 2277. Bestermann, 2333-2334. C. Starace, Bibliografia della Corsica, Rome, 1943, p. 703, no. 7271; Italian Union Catalogue, IT\ICCU\TO0E\007632.

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