Aurelii Macrobii Ambrosii Theodosii, Viri Cunsularis & illustris, In Somnium Scipionis Libri II. Eiusdem Conviviorum Saturnaliorum Libri VII.

Paris: Unknown. Good with no dust jacket. 1585. First Edition Thus. Leather. [xvi], 578, [lxxx] pp. Small octavo. Full leather binding, probably 1600s, with blind ruling to the covers. Boards are scuffed and worn but still functional, spine covering is quite worn with evidence of old amateurish repair, joints cracking. Interior pastedowns are gone, first blank is quite browned and chipped and it is pulling away from the block, hinges cracked but sewing still strong. Interior text is clean and unmarked, a little browned near the front and back but otherwise good. In Latin with Greek text passages, primarily in Italic. No printer is given and Estienne apologized for the quality of the printing which is in some parts a bit light, although still quite legible. Edited by the celebrated scholar/printer Henri Estienne (in Latin, Henricus Stephanus). It contains the important mystical Commentary on the Dream of Scipio - Cicero's account of a dream Roman general Scipio had two years before he conquered Carthage. Macrobius takes the dream and uses it to expound on Neo-Platonic, Stoic mystical and astronomical ideas -- ideas about Pythagorean thought, a round earth, the creation of the universe, the strange music of the spheres; all of which permeated Medieval thought. This edition also contains the other major text by Macrobius, the Saturnalia. Here, Macrobius describes the banquets and discussions held in the house of Vettius Praetextatus. He covers a broad range of topics -- mythological and astronomical, medical, tantalizingly citing numerous ancient texts, many of them now lost to history. This 1585 edition is important historically as it is also based on several manuscripts which had just been reviewed by the scholar Estienne; because of its importance, it was destined for the famed Frankfurt Fair, where booksellers and buyers in the Middle Ages and Renaissance went (and still go) to buy books In this book, besides the text and commentary, Estiennes also explains the process of examining old manuscripts and arriving at a definitive text -- a fascinating look at the efforts of a great classical scholar; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 578 pages .