DODOENS, Rembert (1517-1585) - Stirpium historiae pemptades sex. Antwerp: Plantin-Moretus, 1616. Second and most ...

DODOENS, Rembert (1517-1585) - Stirpium historiae pemptades sex. Antwerp: Plantin-Moretus, 1616. Second and most definitive edition of Dodoens' "last and most comprehensive botanical work" (Hunt), including more illustrations than the first edition. Plantin acquired a portion of the blocks, those already used for the octavo edition of Leonhard Fuchs' herbal, from the widow of Jan van der Loe, the publisher of Dodoens' Cruydeboek. The rest were the work of the artist Pieter van der Borcht, whose collection of paintings in the Staatsbibliothek in Berlin forms one of the most important surviving collections of 16th-century flower paintings. Folio (348 x 226mm). Engraved architectural title with figures of Theophrastus and Dioscorides, over 1,300 woodcuts in the text, Plantin's device on verso of final leaf, woodcut initials (without final blank, title with small loss in the margin, slightly shorter together with the second leaf, reinforced and mounted as the final two leaves of the first gathering, both slightly frayed in outer margin, some browning and spotting). Modern leather over marbled paper. Provenance: Henrici Rouven? (ownership note on title) - Bibliotheca chirurgica, Paris (red stamp on title) - Faculté de Medicine (stamp on verso of title) - K.U. ? L.B. (stamp) - Vittorio Arioli (bookplate).