[INCUNABLE]. [RIGHT]. [GRÉGOIRE IX]. - Lot 24

[INCUNABLE]. [RIGHT]. [GRÉGOIRE IX]. Extract from the Decretals [Compilatio Decretalium Gregorii IX], printed folio from a Venice or Lyon edition, incunabula from the last quarter of the 15th century. In Latin, on paper, printed in red and black, decoration in red and blue ink added by hand. Drawings of birds, an owl and ornamental foliage (Italy or Lyon?); two blue-painted initials enhanced by red filigree decoration. Dimensions: 195 x 193 mm Leaf truncated, lower part of glossary missing. Part of the Corpus iuris canonici, the Decretals of Gregory IX are an official collection of canon law texts promulgated from the Third Lateran Council to 1234, compiled by Raymond de Peñafort on the orders of Pope Gregory IX (Pope 1227-1241). The first edition of Gregory IX's Decretals appeared under the title [Compilatio decretalium], Speyer, Presses de Vindelin, 1473. In Venice, Nicolas Jenson published an edition with this layout in 1475. Also in Venice, in 1482, we find an edition with the same type of layout: Co[m]pilatio decretaliu[m] gregorij ix, Venetiis, Bartholomei de Alexa[dria]..., 22.VI.1482. In Lyon, in 1481, Jean (or Johann) Syber published an edition with the same layout, in imitation of those printed in Venice, reserving a white rectangle for a miniature or drawings, and using Venetian typefaces for their printing (see reproduction of the first page, A. Claudin, Histoire de l'imprimerie en France au XVe et XVIe siècle, tome III, plate between pp. 194-195). The present leaf is taken from one of the many successive editions published in either Venice or Lyon in the last quarter of the 16th century. There are copies with this white rectangle enhanced or with drawings, and the present example is reminiscent of copies such as the one sold in Lyon, Groupe Ivoire, May 25, 2011, lot 118, with drawings in the space left blank: Compilatio Decretalium Grigorii, Venetiis, impressum cura impensisque Petri Cremonensis, 24 avril 1482.