Small folio, 61 (of 70) lvs, lacking A1 (blank), B1, K6, L1-6. With capital spaces. Illustrated with a 3/4 page woodcut of Adam and Eve and 73 smaller woodcuts (many violent scenes). The first 7 lvs supplied from another copy with some minor rest. to upper outer blank corners, some occasional light marginal dampstaining, but generally in very good condition with good, clean, impressions of the woodcuts. Bound in early 19th c. russia gilt, hinges and ends of spine skillfully repaired, edges gilt
"Rare anthology with the lives of famous and infamous women such as Helen of Troy, Penelope, Dido, Cleopatra, Agrippina, Margaret Queen of England etc. Third Latin edition of ""De Claris Mulieribus"", and the first printed in the Low Countries. Only incunable-edition of this book printed in the Low Countries. The woodcuts are based on the Ulm series of 1473 (Zainer-edition printed in Ulm, 1473), but translated by the 'Brussels woodcutter' into his own characteristic style. Ref. Polain(B) 711 ; BMC, IX, 166 ; Gesamtkatalog Wiegendrucke 4485 ; Goff B 718 ; Pellechet 2475 ; Fairfax Murray, German books, n°77. Scarce, only 29 copies in ISTC. Provenance: Richard Farmer (Shakespearean scholar), with his notes on B2r, described as an un undated fragment in his celebrated sale of 1798 (lot 787). Since then- but before the volume gained its present binding - gathering A (lacking the first blank) has been supplied from a copy with ms. marginalia in Latin. With a 19th c. heraldic bookplate of Francis Scott. Sold by Bernard Quaritch in 1976"
