Eric Chaim Kline, Bookseller - Old and Rare Books

Canones et decreta sacrosancti oecumenici et generalis Concilii Tridentini (The Canons and Decrees of the Sacrosanct Ecumenical and General Council of Trent) [ANNOTATED IN A CONTEMPORARY HAND THROUGHOUT]

(Council of Trent)

Rome: Paolo Manuzio, 1564. First quarto edition. Hardcover. Quarto. Collation: A-Z4 AA-MM4 NN2 (= 142 leaves). 284 pp. (errors in pagination: 200 '100', 226 '220', 270 '970'). Title with large Aldine printer's device (dolphin and anchor). Text in Latin, set in italics; paginated in Arabic numerals. Decorative woodcut initials on black ground throughout. Nineteenth-century forest green paneled morocco (rubbed at extremities; rear joint cracked along bottom half, but cords holding), ruled in gilt and black, gilt fleurons; gilt spine with raised bands; all edges gilt; gilt dentelles and marbled endleaves; green silk ribbon marker. Crisp text with occasional mild foxing and smudges. Text trimmed at fore-edge, resulting in occasional slight loss to copious annotations, else a very good copy.

First quarto edition, with the identical papal privilege as appeared in the first folio edition. Pope Pius IV entrusted the first publication of the canons and decrees of the Council of Trent to the Venetian printer Paulus Manutius (Paolo Manuzio, 1512-1574). The son of Aldus Manutius, one of the most celebrated printers of the early modern era, Paulus was invited to Rome by Pius IV to establish a press devoted to publishing works to counter the growing influence of Protestant scholarship and polemics. Among the most important of these were Reginald Pole's De Concilio and Reformatio Angliae (both 1562), along with official publications like the present Canones et decreta (1564), the Index Librorum Prohibitorum (1564), the Catechismus (1566), and the Breviarium Romanum (1568).

Convened between 1545 and 1563, and overseen by three popes (Paul III; Julius III and Pius IV), the Council of Trent sought a definitive determination of the fundamental doctrinal teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. Key topics included scripture; the biblical canon; sacred tradition; original sin; justification; salvation; the sacraments; the Mass, and the veneration of saints. This response to the Protestant challenge also strived to enact thorough institutional reforms of numerous abuses, a notable instance being the twenty-two chapters of the final session (De regularibus et monialibus) which pertain to monks and nuns. The twenty-five "sessions" into which the published text is divided refer to the formal meetings at which the final texts were ratified after long prior debates. These canons and decrees were first published by Paulus Manutius in 1564 in a larger folio format. As Renouard notes, this first folio was very faulty, and most of the surviving copies were subsequently annotated and corrected by hand. This first edition in folio was immediately reprinted, first at Rome, in a single volume of 284 pages set in italics throughout, paginated in Arabic numerals, and containing the identical text of the privilege granted by Pius IV to Manutius which appears in the first folio (Renouard). Manutius went on to print corrected editions in folio, quarto and octavo and the Canons and Decrees was then widely re-printed at various presses throughout Europe.

Provenance and annotations: Old bookseller's ticket of Librairie Ancienne et Moderne de J[ose]phine M[a]rie Peletan Quai de l'Hôpital, 66, Lyon. Slightly more than half of the pages include underlinings and/or marginal annotations in brown ink in a single, contemporary hand, along with a few, likely later, notes in another hand. Very good. Item #54157

References: Adams 2795; Ahmanson-Murphy 721: "first quarto edition," and noting the same three pagination errors which appear in our copy; Barberi 132; Renouard, Annales de l'imprimerie des Alde (3e éd); p. 190, no. 4; 191, noting this edition as the first to appear after the first folio.

Full title and imprint: Canones, et decreta sacrosancti oecumenici et generalis Concilii Tridentini sub Paulo III, Iulio III, Pio IIII. Pontificibus Max. Romae, Apud Paulum Manutium, Aldi F. M.D.LXIIII. Cum privilegio Pii IIII. Pont. Max. [Colophon, p. 184:] Finis. Romae, apud Paulum Manutium Aldi F. M.D.LXIIII.

Price: $2,000.00