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Thursday 09 March 2023 e Friday 10 March 2023, 03:00 PM • Rome

133

Monti, Vincenzo

Poetry essay, 1779

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€ 150 - 250

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€ 258

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Information

Livorno, from the presses of the Encyclopaedia, 1779. In 8°. Copper engravings in the text, copy in beards, cover in modern cardboard, in a half leather box. § Together in the lot by the same author La Musogonia, Venice, A.Curti, 1797. In 8°. Modern decorated hardcover.  § In death of Ugo Bass-Ville followed in Rome on the fourteenth day Gennaro 1793, Rome, Salvioni, 1793. In 8°. Hardback of the time covered with decorated paper. § On the death of Ugo Bass-Ville. Rome, Salvioni, 1793. Bound with notes printed in Assisi and in Macerata. s.n.t. Traces of use on the first page and old private library stamp, modern hardcover.  § On the death of L.Mascheroni. Cantica. Milan, from the printing house and foundry to the Typographic Genius - Pirotta and Maspero, 1801. In 8°. 3 parts in one vol. Modern cardboard. § Poems by Abbot Vincenzo Monti. Verona, Pietro Bisesti, 1801. In 16th. 3 parts in one vol. Restoration on pp.23-26, modern half leather binding and corners.

Specialist Notes

Beautiful set of works by Vincenzo Monti including:
The first original edition, very rare, of the first collection of poems by Monti; the only poem previously published here is "In praise of Signor Abate Francesco Filippo Giannotti preacher in Ferrara", which was written in 1776 and was later to be better known as "Ezechiello's vision". Several editions were printed, some of which are enriched by small copper engravings, others by wood engravings. This presented is one of the very rare copies accompanied by the copper engravings on pages 34, 86, 87, 97, 121 and by the errata sheet, almost never present. Bustier n.1. The first edition of La Musogonia - in two cantos - printed in Rome in 1793, was burned for political reasons; this second presents changes at the end, and the text is reduced to a single song. Bust n.213.


The first edition of In morte di Ugo Bass-Ville followed in Rome on the fourteenth day Gennaro 1793, more commonly known as Bassvilliana, was composed between January and August of 1793. Without contradicting his own Arcadian foundations, the poet transposes his elevated and ethereal style into a composition that certainly has a greater political significance than the previous ones. Success was immediate, so much so that it reached 18 editions within six months. The model of the Bassvilliana, written in tercets and third rhyme, is certainly Dantesque, but there is also the influence, on a schematic level, of Klopstock's Messiade, which in those years he had also thought of translating from French. In this "long and disproportionate poem", an angel takes the soul of Bassville who has just expired from Rome and brings it to France, showing her the disasters caused by the Revolution, and causing her to cry bitterly at the sight of the killing of Louis XVI. Monti however stopped at the fourth Canto, to move on to the composition of a work more inclined to his mythical tales, La Musogonia (1793-1797, in octaves). Bust n.166.