Daniel Good Rare Books and Engravings
1515 Grüninger incunabula leaf, husbandry, tending the flocks, wool, agriculture
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If wool’s your object, first clear the rough growth
of burs and thistles: avoid rich pastures,
and start by choosing flocks with soft white fleeces.
But even if a ram’s fleece is of the whitest, if he has so much
as a dark tongue in his moist palate, reject him,
in case he taints the wool of the lambs with dusky spots,
and look for another in the richness of your fields.
[Georgics, III, 384ff]
Beautiful engraving from Virgil's Georgics, from the Venetian printing by Giunta of 1515.
29.8 x 20.6 cm
From:
VIRGIL, PUBLIUS MARO (VERGILIUS). Opera accuratissime castigata. I-III. Venice, Lucantonio Giunta, ca 1515.
This Giunta edition from 1515 is rightly acclaimed for its magnificent series of woodcut illustrations based on blocks of the anonymous Late Master of the Grüninger Workshop. According to Essling (I,i, p.75) the woodcuts were first used in an edition printed by Giunta in 1515, but while he was unable to locate a copy of the book he refers to the quantity and importance of the illustrations therein. Subsequently they were used by Giunta in editions of 1519 and 1522.
Very good condition.





