Variant Title:
Plinius Secundus Nouocomensis equestribus militiis industriȩ functus, procurationes quoq[ue] splendidissimas atq[ue] continuas summa integritate administrauit ...
Notes:
Title from incipit (p. [1]).
CMGL copy has leaves numbered to 356.
Imprint from Goff.
Colophon (in verse, p. [710]) reads: Quem modo tam rarum cupiens uix lector haber[et]: quisq[ue] etiam fractus pene legendus eram: restituit Venetis me nuper Spira Ioannes: exscripsitq[ue] libros ȩre notante meos. Fessa manus quondam moneo: calamusq[ue] quiescat. Nanq[ue] labor studio cessit: & ingenio. M.CCCC.LXVIIII.
Leaves printed on both sides; 50-52 lines per page.
Unsigned gatherings.
Final leaf (p. [711]-[712]) blank.
Goff P-786
Hain-Copinger-Reichling 13087
Proctor 4018
Dibner Library. Heralds of Science (1980 ed.), 75
Label copy from the 1950s: The discovery of glass. The great Natural History of Pliny contains the most important early account of glassmaking. It deals at length with the origin of glass and its uses. In this work first appears the famous legend of the seafarers' picnic on the shores of Phoenicia: "The merchants, while preparing their repast, finding no stones at hand for supporting their cauldrons, employed some lumps of nitre taken from the vessel. Upon its being subjected to the fire, in combination with the sand of the seashore, they beheld transparent streams flowing forth of a liquid hitherto unknown: this, it was said, was the origin of glass." One hundred copied of this first edition were printed, of which only a few have survived. This copy was once in the library of the Earls of Pembroke.
Digitized by Boston Photo Imaging in September 2009.
Origin of glass and glass manufacture: leaf 360; Obsidian and other types of glass: leaf 360b.
