Philippus Mayolus (1 results)

Condition: Very good. First Edition. First edition published in France of this influential Latin collection of Aesopian-fables - almost certainly the edition used by fairy tale-popularizer Charles Perrault for his French translation of 1699. Faerno's Neo-Latin fables were first published in 1563 as FABULAE CENTUM and soon became the most successful original work in the Aesopian tradition until La Fontaine; like La Fontaine, Faerno adapted classical sources like Aesop as well as writing his own fables. In fact, this edition's name refers to another important fabulist and celebrated Latin translator of Aesop, Phaedrus, whose work was rediscovered in the Renaissance; Faerno's fables were considered so good that many thought he cribbed them from Phaedrus - a charge against which Perrault defended him in his French translation of 1699. This edition was published the same year as Perrault's book of fairy tales, HISTOIRES OU CONTES DU TEMPS PASSÉ (1697). Perrault appears to have begun his translation of Faerno around the same time, suggesting that Perrault saw his fairy-tale work as linked to the fabulist tradition going back to Aesop. This edition, the first printed in France (according to the anonymous preface), was meant especially for the education of children, rearranging some of the entries to start with those easier to comprehend. Ashby notes that "Aesop's fables were not originally created for children" (6), but rather were intended as lessons for adults. Yet Faerno's own Aesopian fables were seen as a pedagogical tool from the beginning (especially for teaching students Latin); it was works like this one that helped transform the wisdom tradition of the Aesopian fable into what we now see as a children's genre, side by side with the fairy tale tradition. 12mo, 5.5'' x 3.25''. Contemporary vellum, green goatskin spine label. [22], 156, [12] pages. Boards bowed, with notable soil. Faint dampstaining to text, a couple small losses to rear endpaper. Tight.…