37 - BEMBO, Pietro. *Le Prose*—*Gli Asolani*—*Le Rime*—*Stanze*.

BEMBO, Pietro. *Le Prose*—*Gli Asolani*—*Le Rime*—*Stanze*. An excellent 16th-century Venetian edition bringing together the major works of one of the great masters of Renaissance poetry, in a period binding. Venice, Gualtero Scotto, 1552 (and 1553 for *Gli Asolani*). Four works in a sturdy in-12 volume, full cream vellum, straight spine, handwritten title at the top of the spine “Bembo Prose. Asolano. Rime” and at the bottom “Vineg.1552.” 266 pp. - (27 ff.); (8 ff.) - 115 pp.; (2 ff.) - 44 pp. - (4 ff.); 10 unnumbered folios. In Italian. Minor stains and soiling on the vellum; the title page of *Le Prose* is fragile; a few faint water stains; virtually free of foxing. A composite collection bringing together the bulk of Cardinal Pietro Bembo’s (1470–1547) works. These editions were published just a few years after the author’s death by Gualtiero Scotto, a printer of Flemish origin whose elegant typographic mark—combining the mythological figures of Hermes and Athena—is particularly noteworthy. This collection, in the more manageable in-12 format, opens with *Le Prose*, one of the most important theoretical texts of the 16th century. In this treatise “della vulgar lingua,” Bembo settles the “language dispute” by establishing the Florentine dialect as the standard for Italian literature. He establishes a dual authority: Boccaccio for prose and Petrarch for poetry. The edition contains a few handwritten annotations in ink in Italian in the margins. The following three works perfectly illustrate the practical application of the author’s linguistic theories: - *Gli Asolani*, dedicated to Lucrezia Borgia, is a philosophical and courtly dialogue that influenced the poetry of the Pléiade in France. - *Le Rime* and *Le Stanze*. Bembo became the foremost of the “Petrarchists.” His formal rigor and musicality became a model for Renaissance lyric poetry. Engraved bookplate by Alexandre Gitton du Plessis, a 19th-century bibliophile from Blois, and a Pottier de La Morandière bookplate (20th century). Handwritten (now faded) bookplate on the title page of *Prose*. A beautiful, well-preserved copy.