Beschreibung:

4°, circa 22,5 x 16 cm., 353 (recte 335) pp., 8 ff., with a woodcut portrait and historiated initials. Full vellum (probably somewhat later) Adams G 709; STC 305; Gamba 1435 note. First edition of this epic poem about Hercules by the philosopher and medical doctor Giovanni Battista Giraldi, called Cinzio (1504-1573), who taught at the university of Ferrara and served as a private secretary to Ercole II d'Este, Duke of Ferrara to whom this work is also dedicated. Giraldi originally planned to write another 24 cantos but instead turned to other literary projects for the theatre. In fact it has been noted that parts of this epic remind of the stage - "il Cavalcanti scriveva d avervi trovato cose piu da coturno che da socco." (Gamba). Giraldi is today best remembered for his play Hecatommiti, which was apparently also read and inspired Shakespeare. - Title with a small damage to the outer white margin and reinforced with a thin slip of paper in the outer blank margin.Only the very first leaves with little staining, else clean, endpapers with old notes. - PROVENANCE: pastedown with the armorial bookplate of Alexander von Huebner (1811-1892), the Austrian diplomat, born as Josef Hafenbredl and an illegitimate child of the chancellor Metternich with the niece of the k. k. Hofglashändler (glass merchant) Rohrweck. From the year 1833 he assumed the name Alexander von Hübner and served on several missions in Italy. During the 1848 Revolution he was taken hostage in Milano and later in the 1860ies served as Austrian ambassador in Rome.