![]() ![]() One of the first books to be printed in Italy, the 1469 Pliny was produced in no more than one hundred copies, making it a rare and precious work. This is the first printed edition of Pliny’s encyclopedia, published in 1469 in Venice by the famous German printer Johannes de Spira, only fifteen years after Gutenberg’s introduction of movable type to Europe. Despite his shaky Latin, Leonardo seems to have consulted the Latin original as well as Cristoforo Landino’s Italian translation. Printed in some eighteen editions between 14, the encyclopedia was a standard work of reference in the Renaissance. ![]() The only text that has come down to us from Pliny’s prolific pen, Natural History is a tome whose sheer volume and great scope attest to his rare erudition. In the preface, dedicated to Titus (who became emperor shortly before Pliny’s death in the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius on August 24, 79), Pliny explained his aim as the study of “the nature of things, that is, life.” Pliny’s ambitious undertaking quotes more than four hundred authorities and includes material on animals, plants, stones, metals, botany, medicine, geography, literature, and the arts. Completed in 77 CE, the work, composed of thirty-seven books, is considered the first scientific encyclopedia. ![]() Pliny the Elder’s Natural History is among the greatest monuments of the literature of antiquity. ![]()
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