Author: Spada, Valerio (1613-1688); Caccavello, Giovanni Paolo; and Pulcharelli, Constanzo (1568-1610).
Title: Constantii Pvlcharelli E Societate Iesu Carminvm Libri Qvinqve. His Adiecti Dialogus de Vitijs Senectutis, Et Homericae Iliadis Libri Duo, E Graeco in Latinum Conuersi. Impensis Houphrii Montii. [with the Rare Frontispiece by Valerio Spada].
Description: Florentiae: Amadorus Massa, Anno Iubilaei 1650. 1650. WITH THE RARE FRONTISPIECE ENGRAVING BY VALERIO SPADA - Duodecimo (12mo), 5-1/2 inches high by 3-1/8 inches wide. Hardcover, bound in three quarter leather and marbled paper covered boards with gilt decorations and gilt-titled leather labels on the spine, with one of the labels indicating that this book is "N.15" of a privately bound collection. The covers are rubbed with some of the paper more heavily rubbed at the corners. Remnants of a paper label adhere to the spine. The text block is mostly inrtact though the front hinge is cracked and the spine has pulled away from the text block. Half-title, frontispiece leaf and, title leaf illustrated with the Jesuit emblem, followed by pages 3-28, [2] & pages 1-417. Illustrated with a frontispiece by Valerio Spada, 28 woodcut initials and 9 tailpieces. Spada's bold frontispiece, headed by a title banner proclaiming "Aliusque & idem", above an image which portrays a man in classical Greek robes standing at the tip of land on a lake looking up at a flat topped tree at the top of which are three men and a a couple of goats. The anthropomorphized sun looks on from above as what may be a phoenix flies above. A banner near the lower right is titled "Pulcharelli Poesis". The frontis is signed lower left "V. Spada". The first signature, consisting of the endpaper and front blank, is detached though present. Several previous owners' names are penned on the half-title, and there are minor ink annotations in the margins of the frontispiece. There are further minor annotations on the last blank page. The binding is shaken with a few lightly pulled signatures (i.e. group of pages). A complete copy of an internally attractive rare book.

Constanzo Pulcharelli (1568-1610) was born in Massa Lubrense. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1583. He was a student of literature and an expert in Latin & Greek. His translation of the first two cantos of the Iliad were published in Frankfurt in 1604. His original poetry was published posthumously by his brother, Giovanni Paolo Caccavello, in Naples in 1618. Pulcharelli was a student of medicine. His didactic poem on good health, "Paeoniae, seu de valetudine tuenda", appears in this volume as well as his dialogue on the vices of old age, "Dialogus de vitijs Senectutis". The dedicatory epistle and preface have been written by his brother. The work is edited by Onofrio Monti.

The rare frontispiece is an engraving by Valerio Spada. Spada, 1613-1688, was a draughtsman, etcher and calligrapher. He studied drawing with Lorenzo Lippi. Employed by the Medici, he was greatly influenced by his colleague in the Medici court Stefano della Bella. In the catalogue raisonee of his prints, Phyllis Dearborn Massar comments on this engraving under the section titled "Prints by Valerio Spada Cited but not Found": "This book by Constanzo Pulcharelli was published by Massi, Florence, in 1650 and is 12mo in size. It was in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale in Florence, but perished in the flood. I have not been able to find it elsewhere. Cited by the Poligrafo Gargani; also by G. Boffito, 'Frontespizi incisi nel libro italiano del seicento', Florence 1922, p. 117". - ["The Prints of Valerio Spada-II" by Phyllis Dearborn Massar in Print Quarterly, March 1987, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp.19-39]. Good .

Keywords: LITERATURE; POETRY; VALERIO SPADA; GIOVANNI PAOLO CACCAVELLO; CONSTANZO PULCHARELLI; CONSTANTII PVLCHARELLI E SOCIETATE IESU CARMINVM LIBRI QVINQVE. HIS ADIECTI DIALOGUS DE VITIJS SENECTUTIS, ET HOMERICAE ILIADIS LIBRI DUO, E GRAECO IN LATINUM CONUERSI; I

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