SIFTING THROUGH VORAGINE
VORAGINE, Jacobus de.
Sermones quadragesimales [– de tempore & de sanctis per totum annum] …
[(Colophons:) Venice, Simon de Luere for Lazarus de Suardis, 12 September 1497; – 31 August 1497.]
Parts III and I only (of IV), in one vol., 4to, ff. III: [97], I: [152]; aa8 (-aa8, blank) bb–kk8 ll4 mm8 nn6, 28 34 a–r8 s4; gothic type, text in double columns, woodcut illustration to each title depicting the author sitting at a desk on which rest a book and a bishop’s mitre, preaching to a group of clerics, woodcut Suardis device on ll4; first leaf slightly stained around edges, occasional light marginal staining and minimal worming (not affecting text), inkstain to n3–4, but withal very good copies; near-contemporary north Italian blind-stamped panelled sheep sides neatly laid down over sympathetic late nineteenth-century sheep, 4 pairs of vestigial ties, edges stained yellow, marbled endpapers; worming to rear board with very slight loss; manuscript annotations throughout (to c. 200 pp) including underlinings and marginal notes, some numbering of sections and simple manicules, armorial bookplate of John Vertue, Bishop of Portsmouth (1826–1900), to front pastedown, small paper shelflabel to foot of front board.
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Sermones quadragesimales [– de tempore & de sanctis per totum annum] …
An annotated copy of Jacobus de Voragine’s sermons, one of the most popular medieval sermon collections, composed in the late thirteenth century. Jacobus de Voragine (Jacopo da Varazze) was a Dominican preacher from Genoa who produced several model books of sermons, providing variations to be used by preachers according to the occasion and the audience, aimed at his fellow Dominicans (as depicted in the woodcut) to disseminate Dominican doctrine.
The sections in this volume contain the sermons for Lent and for the feasts of the church year (the parts containing the sermons on the saints and the Mariale are not present). Most surviving copies are also composed of just one or two parts, and not always consecutive parts, as here, indicating that the sections could be bought separately to meet the requirements of the purchaser.
This copy displays evidence of close reading throughout; around two hundred pages contain annotations of some sort, often pulling out themes and phrases from the text, and numbering sections or consecutive themes for ease of reference. The annotations seem to be in the same early hand in varying colours of brown and grey ink, a few now somewhat faded, presumably written at different times.
HC 6525; GW M11684; Goff J202; BSB-Ink I-113; Bod-Inc J-084; ISTC ij00202000; Sander 7733; cf. BMC V 274 (part II) and XII 41 (part IV).
