Memorie del calcio fiorentino. Tratte da diverse scritture.

Florence: stamperia di S.A.S. alla Condotta, 1688. Engraved armorial title-vignette by Francesco Nacci which includes a figure holding a football, two folding engraved plates, the first by Alexander Cecchini showing the players lined up for the start of play in the Piazza Sante Croce and the second a diagram of their positions. [6]ff. 180 pp. 4to., contemporary vellum over paste-board, spine ruled and lettered in gilt with floral device in 6 of the 7 compartments. A few small wormholes in the binding, otherwise a superb, bright and crisp copy. Housed in a later tan leather clamshell box (with some wear but still attractive).||A superb copy of the first edition of Pietro Bini’s anthology of works on Florentine football, published to commemmorate the game played during the wedding festivities of Ferdinando de’ Medici and Princess Violante Beatrice of Bavaria in December to January 1688-9.
The players in this celebratory game were all members of the Florentine aristocracy and they are all listed as teams at the end under ‘Europei (color Rosino) and Asiatici (Color Verde)’.
The works in this anthology include a newly edited edition of Bard’s ‘Discorso’, originally published in 1580 and which was the first printed book on football. Also there is a Latin treatise on the game by the Jesuit G.B. Ferrari, a description of the game in Greek verse by Georgios Koresios followed by a translation into Tuscan dialect by A.M. Salvini, and a ‘Cantata in musica’ by Jacopo del Borgo.
With the small bookseller’s label of Chiesa in Milan and the booklabel of the noted collectors Donald & Mary Hyde.|Cicognara 3177, Gamba 99, Brunet I, 653 Florentine football - the first anthology on football