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Bryars & Bryars

First critical edition' of Arrian's history of Alexander the Great

First critical edition' of Arrian's history of Alexander the Great

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[Arrianou Peri Anabaseos Alexandrou historion biblia 8] Arriani (qui alter Xenophon vocatus fuit) De expedit. Alex. Magni historiarum libri VIII [...] Ex Bonavent. Vulcanii Brg. nova interpretatione [...]

This book is described by Dibdin as ‘the first critical edition of the expedition of Alexander by Arrian’ (although the princeps appeared in 1535) and by Schreiber as an ‘important edition’ of Arrian’s Anabasis of Alexander the Great, and its continuation, the Indica. 

Flemish humanist and professor of Greek at Leiden, Bonaventura Vulcanius (de Smet, 1538-1614, from Bruges), was apparently supplied by Henri Estienne with ‘an ancient’ manuscript ‘when at Constantinople’. Plutarch's life of Alexander was edited by Henri Estienne, and Plutarch’s essay De Alexandri Magni fortuna vel virtute was translated by Guillaume Bude. 

Condition & Materials
Folio. pp. [xii], 200 (misnumbered 198), 70 (misnumbered 68), [xii]. Parallel text in Greek and Latin. 

Modern blind-stamped calf in period style. 

Early ownership signatures and inscriptions to title-page of John Gregory, Henry Ware and Thomas Ramsey. 

References
Dibdin, Classics, I, 328
Renouard, Estienne, 142
Schreiber, Estiennes, 195

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