L. Annaeus Florus [Works]

Lugd. Batav. Leiden: apud Elzevirios, 1638. First Elzevier Edition

FLORUS, Lucius Annaeus. L. Annaeus Florus [Works], CL. Salmasius, addidit Lucium Ampelium. & cod. M.S. nunquam antehac editum. Lugd. Batav. [Leiden]: apud Elzevirios, 1638.

First Elzevier edition, second issue, with pp. 200 and 336 misnumbered as 220 and 536 respectively. Twelvemo (4 15/15 x 2 3/4 in; 126 x 70 mm). [8], 536 [i.e. 336], [16, index] pp. Engraved illustrated title-page, headpieces, tailpieces, initials.

Contemporary vellum. Yapp edges. Manuscript title to spine. Bookplate of Henry Scott Boys, late Bengal Civil Service, Allahabad. Neat ownership signatures to endpapers and title-page. Quarter inch wormhole to [ii-vii, 2]. Occasional early and neat underlinings. Small loss to spine head/upper board at joint. Otherwise an excellent copy in its original seventeenth century vellum binding.

"At the better grammar schools of the time the relevant authors studied were Ovid, Cicero, Caesar, Sallust and Livy. At Eton the boys in the fifth form read Valerius Maximus and Lucius Florus. There is no reason to suppose that Shakespeare knew all these, but if he went to Stratford Grammar School he would not only be able to read but to imitate the style of several of them... if he wished to consult any of the major Roman historians in Latin he could do so profitably and without great difficulty" (Bullough, Narrative and Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare). Florus was not translated into English until 1619.

"Florus' abridgement of Roman history, well-known to English schoolboys in Latin form, refers to Coriolanus briefly in his Book I, and gives a version of the fable of the Body's Members" (Gillespie, Shakespeare's Books, p. 171).

Goldsmid II, p. 47. Willems 467. Copinger 1738.