Niccolo Gualtieri, 1742

GUALTIERI, Niccolo (1688-1744). Index testarum conchyliorum quae adservantur in Museo Nicolai Gualtieri. Florence: C. Albizzini, 1742.

A very fine copy of the first edition of one of the most beautiful and curious book on shells every published. Gualtieri was a professor at Pisa and the physician of Cosimo III, Grand Duke of Tuscany, a keen collector who owned a magnificent cabinet of shells. Gualtieri received many of his duplicates, and this publications documents his collection with exceptional engraving and typography. Many of the shells are depicted from multiple sides, and vignettes throughout depict corals and other marine leaf. Cobres p 110, n 23; Nissen ZBI 1736.

Folio (441 x 293mm). Allegorical frontispiece, frontispiece portrait, 110 numbered full-page plates, 17 vignettes on section titles, 18 other vignettes and plates in text, 2 initials, main title and section titles in red and black. Contemporary marbled calf gilt, spine with gilt panels with lyres within sunbursts (a bit rubbed). Provenance: unidentified armorial bookplate.