FIRST CROATIAN MISSAL
[KASIC, Bartol, or Bartholomaeus CASSIUS.]
Rituale Romanum Urbani VIII Pont. max. Iussu editum illyrica lingua.
Rome, Congregatio de Propaganda Fide, 1640.
[issued with:]
KASIC, Bartol. Ritual Rimski Istomaccen Slovinski. V Riimu, Iz Vtiestenicae Sfet; Skuppa od Razplodyenya S. Vierrae, 1640.
Two parts in one vol., 4to, pp. [34], 82; 450, [2]; I: text printed in red and black, diagrams to text, engraved vignette on title, typographic tailpiece; II: text printed in red and black, printed musical notation, large engraved vignette on title and several engraved vignettes throughout; very light toning to pages, but a very good copy, in contemporary stiff vellum, ink titling on spine; a few pencil annotations in the margins in Croatian; stamp of Cardinal Gabrielli to first title and p. 1, paper printed exlibris of C. Lacy Hulbert-Powell to the front pastedown.
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Rituale Romanum Urbani VIII Pont. max. Iussu editum illyrica lingua.
First edition, rare especially as complete with both parts as here, of the first Roman Missal in Croatian, an important association copy from the library of a Prefect of Studies of the Propaganda Fide. The Missal is printed in Shtokavian (or Štokavian), the prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. The Missal is adorned with many woodcuts and includes musical notation.
As well as publishing the first such translation of the Missal, Jesuit Bartol Kašić (Bartholomaeus Cassius, 1575–1650) published the first Croatian/Illyrian grammar and produced (but did not published) a translation of the Bible. After his formative years in Pag (then Republic of Venice, now Croatia) and Rome, and after his ordination in the Society of Jesus, Kašić embraced the Catholic and Pan-Slavic propaganda activities of Aleksandar Komulović. He lived in Dubrovnik from 1609 to 1612. In 1612-13, disguised as a merchant, he went on a mission to the Ottoman provinces of Bosnia, central Serbia, and eastern Slavonia, whence he reported to the Pope Paul V.
A second mission was carried out in 1618-19; details of both were included later in his (incomplete) autobiography. After a second stay in Dubrovnik (1620 to 1633) he returned to Rome, where he spent the rest of his life. There he published several works, the most remarkable being the long and detailed Ritual rimski, running to over four hundred pages, and soon used by all Croatian dioceses and archdioceses except for the one in Zagreb, which also accepted it in the nineteenth century.
Provenance: from the personal library of Cardinal Giovanni Maria Gabrielli (1654–1711), esteemed theologian, Qualificator of the Inquisition, and Prefect of Studies at the Urbanian College of the Propaganda Fide in Rome, who famously defended François Fénelon during his Inquisition trial for sympathies to Quietism.
Sommervogel IV, col. 937. Though library records are sometimes unclear regarding the presence of one or both parts, a search through OCLC reveals three copies for the Latin part (BL, Glasgow, and NSW) and together five in the UK and US for the Ritual rimski (CUL, Yale, Harvard, Ohio, and Utah); some other copies are held in institutions in Continental Europe.
