BERNARDUS CLARAVALLENSIS (1090-1153). Sermones de tempore et de sanctis, et De diversis, una cum homilis et epistolis. Milan: Leonardus Pachel, 5 October 1495. [Bound with:] BERNARDUS CLARAVALLENIS. Epistolae. Milan: Leonardus Pachel, 15 December 1495.

The sermons of Doctor Mellifluus. This edition of the sermons of the honey-tongued Cistercian monk is bound with an edition of his letters. The two works, while issued separately, appear also to have been conceived as a pair: they are uniform in layout, and the Epistolae are mentioned in the title of the Sermones. HC 2850, 2873; GW 3946, 3927; BMC VI 781; BSB-Ink B-319, B-312; IGI 1561, 1525; Goff B-441, B-387; ISTC ib00441000, ib00387000.

Chancery quarto (211 x 150mm). First work: 242 leaves; second work: 164 leaves. 2 full-page woodcuts of Bernard of Clairvaux (identical), one blue painted initial, smaller woodcut initials throughout (some staining and toning, one leaf with small paper flaw in margin). Contemporary blindtooled calf over wooden boards, front pastedown reused from manuscript with fragment describing the parable of the ten virgins, author in ink on upper board (lacking straps, some small repairs). Provenance: marginalia in several hands – effaced inscription on first leaf – Teodoro Becu (1890-1946, Argentine collector and bibliographer; morocco book label) – Giorgio di Veroli (1890-1952, Italian financier and collector who fled to New York City during WWII; bookplate; his sale, Parke-Bernet, 28 February 1956, lot 92) – acquired there via Lucien Goldschmidt.