Emblematum Libellus
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Author
Alciati, Andrea
Date
1542. Christian Wechel/Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Wissenschaftliche Buchgeselschaft. Darmstadt, (Ger.),
Category
Tangential.
Language note: Bilingual: Latin/German.
Call No:
PN6349.A413 1967 (Carlson Fable Collection, BIC bldg)
.
1542
Tangential
Language note: Bilingual: Latin/German
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Remark:
This is my first chance to look more carefully into Alciato. This volume itself is one of many good books I found at Wirthwein. I had not known that the Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft had done a reprint of Alciato's book of emblems. I seem to read that the original book of his that began the whole emblem movement was published in 1531. Perhaps it was a more modest book than this 1542 edition. Here we have one hundred and fifteen emblems, beginning on 18 and ending on 253. There is no apparent index. A typical pair of pages features on the left, a page number and standard page title (And. Alc. Emblem. Lib.); a short title phrase and emblem number; an image regularly about 2½ x 2¾; and a Latin poem of six or eight lines. The right hand page has a regular page title (Das buechle der verschroten werck.), a German title and emblem number; and a German poem of about eight lines. Fable motifs occur but do not dominate. Emblem XXII is about the blind carrying the lame. Emblem XXXV -- non tibi, sed religioni -- is the fable of the ass carrying a religious image. He thinks that the people are honoring him. Emblem XLVIII shows the fox contemplating a human face and is titled Mentem, non formam plus pollere. Emblem LI shows an ass carrying great food but stopping to eat a thistle. Emblem LIIII presents the beetle that got revenge on the eagle by getting all his eggs broken. Emblem LV presents the captured soldier-trumpeter who claimed -- without success -- that he had hurt no one. Emblem LVIII (misnumbered on the right page as LVII) is 2P. In Emblem LXXXIII, a man aiming his bow at a flying crane is killed by a snake: Qui alta contemplantur cadere. Emblem LXXXIIII, Impossibile, is about washing an Ethiopian white. Emblem LXXXVI has a curious mouse caught by an oyster that has clapped shut around him. In Emblem XCI (misprinted CXI), a goat has to suckle a young wolf and knows that this will not end well.