COMMENTARIA... Nunc primum a viro docto expolite: & optime recognita. Additis de novo apostillis: una cum figuis suis locis apte disposiris

Venezia: Agostino Zani, 1511. A Very Early Folio Illustrated Edition incorporating incunabular plates, of Caesar's Commentaries, a core classical text of the Roman period. Illustrated with incunabular woodcuts from plates used for the 1493 edition of Livy. The title page is printed in red and there is a very fine, large woodcut to the title leaf (92 x 120 mm) within an elaborate border printed in red and repeated on the first leaf of text, within an altogether different woodcut border printed in black. There is a woodcut of approximately the same size at f. 51; twelve smaller woodcuts (each approx. 56 x 74 mm) are placed at the beginning of each chapter. Folio (mm 314x210), contemporary Italian half goatskin over wooden boards, goatskin on the sides with blind-ruled geometric designs, a pair of scallop-shaped brass fore-edge catches on front cover, vellum half pastedowns cut from a 14th-century theological manuscript. A very handsome copy of this rare illustrated work. VERY RARE. ONE OF THE EARLIEST AND MOST BEAUTIFUL ILLUSTRATED EDITIONS AND THE IMPORTANT FIRST PRINTING IN ITALY OF AN ILLUSTRATED EDITION OF THIS GREAT CLASSICAL WORK. The title woodcut depicts a battle scene; the second large woodcut shows Lentulus seated addressing the Senate. The woodblocks depicted, were first used in Giunta’s 1493 edition of Livy and were immensely successful and consequently passed on from printer to printer.
Considered very rare. A superbly illustrated edition of Cćsar, apparently the first illustrated Cćsar published in Italy. The title woodcut is strongly reminiscent of Uscello's great tryptich, "The Battle of San Romano," and the spare line of the woodcuts at the head of each chapter is perhaps inspired by Aldus' HYPNEROTOMACHIA POLIPHILI (1499). The text was edited by L. Panaetius. The Duc de Rivoli (Livres a figures Venitiens, p. 160) records an edition printed at the same press in 1517. A highly important book and a very desirable copy.
Julius Caesar was anxious to establish his own record of his successful campaigns in Gaul from 58 to 52 B.C., which includes the less successful invasion of Britain. To answer those who accused him of purely personal ambition, he wished to appear as a straightforward soldier, fighting wars that were essential to Rome. Fascinating for its insights into a man who shaped the history of the western world, his first-hand account of the Gallic Wars is a crucial source for the history of Britain and Germany as well as Gaul. Books I[VII were probably written year by year, when events were fresh in Caesar’s mind and issued together in 51 B.C. Book VII ends with the defeat of Cercingetorix so that Aulus Hirtius (d. 43 B.C.) Caesar’s lieutenant in Gaul, took up the narrative in Book VII with the ensuing uprisings and the beginnings of Caesar’s disputes with the authorities in Rome.
Despite the fact that Julius Caesar is one of the most famous men in history, only a handful of his extensive writings survive to the present day. The “Commentaries” were written not to suggest a history, but rather as a bald record of events. Caesar wished to create an impression that he was just a simple soldier fighting for the good of Rome. It is unique as a contemporary account of a drawn out (nine years) foreign war written by a Roman general, and also for its lucid and unrhetorical language. The work was probably first published in 51 BC.
This “Opera” contains his primary works, “Commentaries on the Gallic War” and the three books of the Civil Wars in Rome with Pompey, the Alexandrian War, the African Wars, the Spanish War. And there is a fine and extensive index at the end of the volume.