Della vanita delle scienze.

Agrippa von Nettesheim (Heinrich Cornelius); Domenichi (Lodovico, trans.)

Della vanita delle scienze.

Description: woodcut printer's device to title, decorated initials, title a trifle soiled at margins (light traces of glue from binding), very light age yellowing, small faint water stain at blank foot, along outer margin or from upper edge of first and last couple of gatherings, 3 tiny worm holes to upper outer blank corner of A-C8, tiny worm trail to last three leaves (just touching couple of letters), ff. [8], 204, 8vo, 17thC sprinkled calf, expertly rebacked with original spine onlaid, original endpapers preserved, raised bands, very minor expert repair to extremities, all edges sprinkled red, lower joint slightly rubbed, endpapers minimally adhering at gutter of title and last verso, corners a little bumped, early price 'i 6d' inked to front pastedown, early ms. '2181' inked to title

Publication Details: Venice: [Anton Francesco Doni?], 1549

Notes: A very good, clean copy of the second edition of the Italian translation of Agrippa's most praised and criticised work De incertitudine et vanitate scientiarum (1530). First published in 1547, and dedicated to Cosimo I, this is one of several vernacular literal translations of works not aligned with Catholic doctrines which the poet Lodovico Domenichi (1515-64) produced in Venice in the 1540s. Like Domenichi, Anton Francesco Doni (1513-74), to whom this printing has been attributed, was for a time close to the Venetian 'poligrafi', of heterodox leanings, of which Aretino too was a member.The ...moreA very good, clean copy of the second edition of the Italian translation of Agrippa's most praised and criticised work De incertitudine et vanitate scientiarum (1530). First published in 1547, and dedicated to Cosimo I, this is one of several vernacular literal translations of works not aligned with Catholic doctrines which the poet Lodovico Domenichi (1515-64) produced in Venice in the 1540s. Like Domenichi, Anton Francesco Doni (1513-74), to whom this printing has been attributed, was for a time close to the Venetian 'poligrafi', of heterodox leanings, of which Aretino too was a member.The European fame of the German polymath Cornelius Agrippa (1486-1535) for his writings on Hermeticism, the Kabbalah, Neo-Platonism and occultism, started c.1510. His eclectic philosophical views were absorbed in heterodox circles, in Italy too, the same who were also interested in Erasmian doctrines. In 1559 he was added to the index of heretics primae classis, though he was never officially persecuted.Agrippa's ambivalence towards occultism, religion and epistemology caused a mixed reception of De incertitudine – a critique of all arts and sciences. Each of the 102 chapters wittily attacks one discipline, e.g., optics, commerce, medicine, painting, natural philosophy, law, heraldry, anatomy and prostitution. Interesting are the sections on physiognomy (which 'infers nonsense' from horoscopes based on physical appearance), judicial astrology ('an art bringing no certainty, which can be turned into anything, according to opinion') and magic. The conclusion is a celebration of ignorance.No copies recorded in the US; BL and Wellcome recorded in the UK. HIDE

Bibliography: EDIT16 CNCE 000552; Cantamessa n.73 (mentioned); Wellcome I, 82. Not in Durling, Caillet or Ferguson. S. Adorni Braccesi, 'Fra Eresia ed Ermetismo: Tre edizioni italiane di Enrico Cornelio Agrippa di Nettesheim', Bruniana & Campanelliana, 13 (2007), pp.11-29.