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- Original Leaves from Famous Books
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Show moreCaption: "This work, On Duty, (De Officiis) was addressed to Cicero?s son Marcus in the year 43 B.C. In it Cicero gives his viewpoints on many philosophical and ethical questions which center mainly around the theme borrowed from the Stoics. "Man must be virtuous in order to be happy". Like many wealthy Romans, Cicero had sent his son to study philosophy in Athens under the philosopher Cratippus. From Cicero?s famous letter, we learn that he exchanged books with Cleopatra, who was in Rome when this text was written. We wonder whether she received a copy of the De Officiis and, if she did, whether she read it. Cicero?s diction and style established Latin as a vehicle for great prose. This work has a distinction of being the first classical book that appeared in print. In the year 1469, John of Spire and his brother Wendelin, Germans from Rhenish, Bavaria, were well established and encouraged by the city senate of Venice to establish themselves as the first printers in that city and were given an exclusive five year privilege. When John died the following year from the plague, the senate decided that the grant or "patent" given to the brothers had lapsed. Wendelin, however, continued to print four or five years longer, until competition forced him into bankruptcy. Venice soon became the printing center of Europe; before 1480, more than fifty printing establishment were in operation. Daniel Berkeley Updike states that the two brothers, John and Wendelin, made and used the first truly Roman type. It is also thought by some scholars of printing history that Nicolas Jenson worked for the de Spires in the year 1469. It is possible that he really was the creator of the first type used by this press." (Ege, Otto F.)
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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Show more".Virgil was the national poet of Augustan Rome. Under the patronage of rich and powerful Maecenas he was enabled to live the tranquil and secluded life which so well fitted into his own ideals and temperament. In 37 B.C. he finished the Bucolica, which idealizes the farm life which he knew and loved so well in his youth. His second great work was the Georgica, a didactic, realistic poem. Both were written to make farm life in the country so attractive that a migration would start from the city. In the later period Virgil wrote his epic, the Aeneid, to glorify Rome and its rulers. This work bears a close relationship to the writings of Homer. Virgil in these poems assumes the tone of the prophet: 'Rome has equally a mission to fulfill, which is to establish peace and order, and to rule the world through law. ' Virgil excels, in all his writings, in 'that subtle fusion of the music and the meaning of language which touches the deepest and most secret springs of emotion'. His influence on Dante, Chaucer, Spenser, Milton, Wordsworth and Tennyson is clearly evident. Dante selected Virgil to represent human wisdom and to act his own guide through the Inferno" (Ege, Otto F.) "In the year 1750, John Baskerville decided to print, as an avocation, '?.books of consequences ?.and which the public may be pleased to see in an elegant dress and to purchase at such a price as will pay the extraordinary care and expense that must necessarily be bestowed upon them'. Seven years later his publication, this 'Virgil', appeared. According to Macaulay, it 'went forth to astonish all the librarians of Europe'. The type of the day was modernized, the press improved, the paper 'woven' instead of 'laid' (a radical departure), and the freshly printed sheets were pressed between hot plates to 'glaze', thus giving such 'perfect polish that we could suppose the paper made of silk rather than a linen'." (Ege, Otto F.)
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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Show more"Early in 1509, the translation of Sebastian Brant's Narrenschiff by the English priest, Alexander Barclay, was first printed in England. This work of Barclay's called 'Ship of fooles of the world' is more a ship of fools of sixteenth century England than it is a translation of the earlier work. It presents an understanding of the poverty-stricken priest and court-ridden life of the common people during the reigns of Henry VII and Henry VIII. Both the original author, Brant, and the translator, Barclay, held to the general design 'to ridicule the prevailing follies and vices of every rank and profession under the allegory of a ship freighted with fools. Fools are evil and malicious people to be displayed and scolded'. Barclay installs himself as a captain, 'I am the first fole of all the hole navy'. These writers found hundred and ten categories, even in those simple days, to ridicule. It is done in delightful verse. Zeydal states that this book 'played an important role in outmoding medieval allegory and mortality and in directing literature into the channels of the drama, the essay and the novel of character'. The woodcuts which added much to the popularity of Barclay?s translation are crude copies of those who appeared in the original Basle edition, often attributed to young Dürer" "John Cawood, who printed this second edition of the Ship of fooles in 1570, was appointed Royal Printer by Queen Mary in 1553. Strangely enough, he retained this lucrative post under Queen Elizabeth, who, however, made him share the honor and privileges of this title with another printer, Richard Jugge" (Ege, Otto F.)
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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Show moreCaption: "Aeschylus, (525-456 B.C.), the first great writer of tragedies, is distinguished not only for the epic sweep of his plays, their exalted dialogue and fine characterization, but also for his daring and epoch-making innovations. Today Aeschylus would be the answer to Gordon Craig's prayer for a super-man in the theatre. Aeschylus not only was a play-wright and an actor but he also trained the choruses in their singing and dancing; added mechanical accessories; used expressive masks; added and additional actor to complement the chorus; and, most significant, his plays, for the first time, dealt with contemporary scenes. One legend tells us that once, when young Aeschylus was asleep, Dionysius appeared to him in a dream and ordered him to compose tragedies. He started to write the next morning and "succeeded very easily." He won, in all, thirteen first honors in the great contests. Another legend tells us that Aeschylus met his death when an eagle mistook his bald head for a rock and dropped a tortoise on it. The scholar-printer Adrian Turnebus, born in Normandy in 1512, had reached such proficiency in the learned languages at the early age of nine that he surpasses his preceptors. Later, many contemporary German professors, after citing him as an authority in their lectures, always touched their hats in token of respect. Montaigne was fond of interrogating Turnebus in the Boswellian manner. Turnebus at various times served as a professor of Greek and of philosophy, in addition to following the profession of "Typographus Regius." This edition of Aeschylus printed by Turnebus was particularly valued for the accuracy of the text. In it he corrected the notoriously inaccurate Aldine issue."
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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Show more"Francesco Petrarch, 1304-74, as the 'first modern man', inaugurated the Renaissance. Symonds states that in Petrarch ' . . . the particular is superseded by the universal . . . the citizen is sunk in the man . . . his language has lost all traces of the dialect, and his verse fixes the poetic diction for all time in Italy.' This volume of seven-hundred sonnets and canzoni reveals the idealized love of the poet for Laura over a period of forty years and forms ' . . . one of the most splendid bodies of amorous verse in all literature . . . remarkable for exquisiteness and finish'. 'What little I am, such as it is,' the poet said, 'I am through her.' Petrarch's writings gave 'dignity and importance to living this side of the grave '. Petrarch, Dante and Boccaccio are considered the three 'fountains' of Italian literature, although Petrarch judged his Latin writings more important than these immortal sonnets written in Italian" "Gabriel Giolito, the most prolific printer in Italy during the sixteenth century, printed about eight-hundred and fifty books from the date of founding his press in 1539 to his in 1578. In the first twenty-one years, before 1560, twenty-two editions of Petrarch's poems bore his imprint. Giolito also exercised great influence on his contemporaries and successors in the form of and decoration of books, especially of title pages" (Ege, Otto F.)
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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Show moreCaption: "Hieronymus, more generally known as St. Jerome, finished his Herculean task, the preparation of the "Edition of the Holy Scriptures in General Use", or the Vulgate Bible, in the year 414 A.D. Fourteen years were spent in reading and checking the innumerable texts in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. The later language Jerome began to learn only at the age of forty. This Vulgate version of the bible is one of the most important ever compiled. It became the standard Bible of the western world for over a thousand years, although it required several hundred years to win the place it deserved. It gave birth to ecclesiastical Latin, the international language of the medieval world. Many of the existing letters of Jerome give us a picture not only of his violent temper, but also of the resulting controversies regarding his version of the Bible. In one, he called a critic a "two-legged ass", in another, he accused certain copyists of "being more asleep than a wake." With almost superhuman skill and patience, and without the aid of eyeglasses, the Dominicans produced a large number of these "Miniature" or "Portable" Bibles to be used in the Sorbonne, the newly established school of theology of the University of Paris, as well as by the wandering friars of this order. The well executed gothic book-hand of nine lines of writing to an inch was done with a crow or eagle quill. The vellum used was obtained from the internal organs of the newly born or calves and is finer than our present "india" paper. Four hundred leaves measured slightly less than an inch in thickness." (Ege, Otto F.)
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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Show more"Hippocrates' (460-357 B.C) enormous influence on the progress of medicine is due to the fact that he separated medicine from religion and superstition and placed it on a scientific basis. He formulated its ideals in what is known as the Hippocratic Oath, which is administered with great solemnity to graduates of medicine in many universities of today. Almost as universally known as this oath are the aphorisms of the author, such as : "Life is short and the art is long, the occasion fleeting": "Experiences is fallacious and judgment difficult": "The physician must not only be prepared to do what is right himself, but also to make the patient, the attendants, and the externals cooperate". Hippocrates' ideas and observations, with few exceptions, were a profound anticipation of modern knowledge. One exception is his theory of the four humors which make up the body-blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile, whose healthy or unhealthy mixtures depend upon the influence of the heavenly bodies. The famous house of Giunta, printers and publisher, was founded by Niccola in the latter part of the fifteenth century and continued for hundred years. It established important presses in Venice and Florence. Lucantonio in Venice was active from 1482 to 1536. His heirs continued to print under the same fine printers' devices and in the same tradition until the end of the sixteenth century. Many of the Giunta types are attributed to the famous designer, Le Bé. This work of Hippocrates is one of the finer of the later issues from the noted Venetian branch of the Giunta family" (Ege, Otto F.)
Original Leaves from Famous Books
Otto F. Ege Collection
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