ALDROVANDI, Ulisse; Francesca ALDROVANDI (editor). De reliquis animalibus exanguibus libri quatuor, post mortem eius editi: nempe de mollibus, crustaceis, testaceis et zoophytis. Bologna: Giovanni Battista Bellagamba. 1606 [colophon: 1605].
Folio. Contemporary half vellum, lettering piece to spine, title in ink to lower edge of text block, paper library shelfmark label to foot of spine; pp. [8], 593, [29], engraved title and engraved portrait of Aldrovandi after Caracci, large woodcut illustrations throughout, many full-page, woodcut initials, head- and tailpieces, 3F6 colophon with printer’s device (verso blank); extremities a little worn, lettering piece chipped; some light marginal waterstaining throughout, occasional light spotting and offsetting, but generally very good; library stamp “Congreg[atio] Min[orum] Conv[entualium] S[ancti] F[rancisci] Lomb[ardiae] Aust[ralis]” to verso of engraved title; printed paper label “Biblioteca Fagnani” of Federico III Fagnani (1775-1840) and library stamp “Libreria de Cappuccini di Cremona” to front free endpaper (see below).
First edition, complete with Aldrovandi’s portrait and in a contemporary binding, of this richly illustrated treatise on molluscs, crustaceans and zoophytes – one of the earliest works devoted almost entirely to shells – edited and likely co-authored by his wife, Francesca Fontana.
Ulisse Aldrovandi (1522-1605) is widely considered the father of modern natural history. He was the first professor of natural science at the University of Bologna, where he established a botanical garden and a private museum of specimens. De reliquis animalibus exanguibus (“On the Remaining Bloodless Animals”) forms part of his monumental zoological encyclopaedia and represents the most comprehensive conchological work of its time, both in textual scope and in visual documentation. It includes circa 600 illustrations of animals that Aristotle had classified as “bloodless”, many of them based on specimens from Aldrovandi’s famed cabinet. Among these are squids and octopods, various species of crabs and crayfish (including a giant variety, represented in the act of suffocating a man) and a wide array of shells, such as the nautilus, whose shell is also shown carved with fanciful scenes. Aldrovandi discusses not only their natural characteristics but also their culinary and medicinal uses. Several of the original woodblocks and drawings used for this work survive today in the Aldrovandi Museum in Bologna.
Published posthumously, this volume was edited by Aldrovandi’s wife, Francesca Fontana, who also authored the preface. Francesca played a vital role in her husband’s scholarly output: not only she managed the museum (established with her dowry) for a decade after his death, but she also located texts for citation, edited his manuscripts, and is thought to have contributed to the writing of several sections. De reliquis animalibus exanguibus may justly be considered “their shared work” (Le-May Sheffield).
Provenance: From the library of the Franciscan convent of San Francesco Grande in Milan, once the city’s most important church after the cathedral and the original home of Leonardo’s Virgin of the Rocks (London version), suppressed and demolished under Napoleonic rule in 1806. The volume was likely transferred around that time to the library of the Friars Minor Capuchin in Cremona, before entering the collection of Federico III Fagnani (1775-1840), a Milanese nobleman and bibliophile. Fagnani’s vast library of nearly 50,000 volumes was largely donated to the Biblioteca Ambrosiana.
Nissen ZBI 68. See Le-May Sheffield. Women and Science: Social Impact and Interaction.
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