Scarce. 1518 Exemplorum (Exempla) Libri Decem, Ordine, Elegantia,... by Sabellicus and edited by Egnazio. Printed by Schurer.

Scarce to auction and market, a 1518 Schurer printing of Sabellicus' last work, known as the Exempla, with ten books on examples to Christians in the style of Valerius Maximus.

Of interest, a Venetian priest known as Egnazio had gained fame in rivalry with Sabellicus (circa 1500-1506). For example, in 1502 he published critical comments on Sabellicus' interpretations of the classics. When Sabellicus passed, in 1507, he entrusted the manuscript of this work to Egnazio, requesting that he edit and publish it. Egnazio's introduction still can be found in this 1518 edition.

A summary of the ten books (summary from ChatGPT AI prompting and prodding):

Book I — Introductory moral exempla; exemplary lives and general precepts.

Opens the collection with short exempla (anecdotes) that illustrate basic moral virtues and vices and provide models for teaching and preaching. These are the kind of compact, classical-and-biblical stories humanists used as rhetorical and ethical “tools” (the familiar Valerius-Maximus model).

Book II — Public life and civic examples (statesmen, rulers, public action).

Contains anecdotes about rulers, magistrates and civic conduct — cases intended to furnish lessons about prudent government, leadership and public morality. This material draws on classical historical sources and on Sabellicus’s interest in civic history.

Book III — Fortitude, courage and endurance (De fortitudine and allied exempla).

Collections of stories emphasizing fortitude and heroic endurance — military, political or private examples used as exempla for exhortation.

Book IV — Chastity, conjugal behavior and sexual-moral exempla (De castitate; De requisitis ad honestatem coniugii; De indulgentia & amore coniugali).

Two or more chapters here are known by title in later commentaries (e.g., De castitate), and the book groups exempla about sexual virtue and vices, duties of spouses, and prescriptions for honest conduct in marriage — material commonly used in sermons and schoolrooms.

Book V — Dreams, omens and presages (De somniis; De ominibus; De praesagiis).

A thematic cluster on dreams and portents: Sabellicus collects stories about prophetic dreams, ominous signs and their interpretations. Early users of the work often consulted this set for examples on prodigies and prognostication.

Book VI — Prodigies, wonders, and extraordinary occurrences (De prodigiis; De ostentis).

Closely related to Book V, but concentrating on visible wonders — prodigies, strange natural phenomena and ostentations — episodes used to argue moral, religious or political points.

Book VII — Famines, public calamities, monstrous phenomena (De fame memorabili; prodigioso concubitu, etc.).

Contains memorable examples of famine, public disaster and a handful of the more sensational or “curious” items (period commentators remark on Sabellicus’s inclusion of unusual / startling exempla, e.g. “prodigioso concubitu”). These items were used as moralizing or cautionary instances.

Book VIII — Memory, reputation and remarkable deeds (De memoria humanorum; memoria rerum).

Examples that illustrate fame, memory, reputation, and how deeds are remembered (good or ill). Useful for rhetoric (how to praise or condemn by invoking examples).

Book IX — Religious / clerical examples and other moral-theological topics.

Catalogues of historical libraries that own Sabellicus’s Exempla list various small chapters (Eucharistia, clerical matters, temptation, patience, etc.) embedded among the exempla.

Book X — Miscellany, indices and registers (alphabetical register of exempla; author catalog; concluding material).

Bibliographic Details -

Universal Short Title Catalogue (USTC) number 674951, not rare, found in many of the world's best libraries.

Worldcat OCLC catalogue number 934320104.

Title page border with a "G.Z. 1511" (per Worldcat), pointing to an artist known to have been operating in the region of Strabourg circa 1511, but unknown.

With Schurer's printer's device at last printed leaf.

Physical Attributes -

Measures approx. 28.5 x 19.5 x 2 cm. Leather binding. Boards with cambridge-style design with a blind tooled frame of fillet and triangle roll and corner florets; also, an outer frame of two blind fillets. Spine with six raised bands; six compartments decorated in gilt with pointille and florets, one compartment with the author in gilt and the date at the bottom of the spine in gilt. Some writing, in an old hand, along fore-edge but appears fragmentary (like it was once bound with another work). Title page with an illustrated humanist border of putti. Printer's mark at last printed leaf. Quarto in size.

Pages - viii, XCIX, 1 blank leaf (present)

Collation - a-c6, d4, e6, f4, g6, h8, i4, k-n6, o4, p-q6, r4, s6 (collates complete, with last leaf)

Condition -

See pictures. Clean, fresh binding with just a few ring scrapes and similar light marks. Endpapers renewed.

Wide margined with surprisingly white leaves.

First gathering (four leaves) with repair at fore-edge margin (over edges, they can be seen chipped and moisture stained when fix viewed through light). Occasional moisture mark throughout right at fore edge, extends a little farther into margin in a gathering (what they were fixing in first gathering). Also, several small chips to page edges of first "a" gathering leaves.

Occasional fox spots. Erased initials at bottom of title page and shelf mark (or price) at top corner. Slight wave at center of text block. Occasional thumb mark near bottom. A few ink marks on blank last leaf.

Mostly, a surprisingly clean book (see pictures).