Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lucca (1568)
Printed in Venice a year after Tottel’s Miscellany, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lucca (1568) was the last commentary on Dante’s Divine Comedy to be published during the sixteenth century. This was a posthumous publication by the printer Pietro da Fino (fl. 16th cent.); Bernardino Daniello, the commentator, had died in 1565.
Very little is known about Bernardino Daniello. Originally from Lucca, he worked principally in Venice, writing poetry and commentaries on the works of Petrarch and Virgil, in addition to his Dante commentary.
Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lucca (1568) contains three engravings, attributed to Pietro da Fino, modelled after three drawings by Sandro Botticelli (1445–1510). Botticelli’s illustrations had been commissioned by Lorenzo de’ Medici for a personal manuscript edition of the Divine Comedy. The first illustrated edition of the Divine Comedy, published by Nicolaus Laurentii (fl. 1475–1486) in 1481, contained copperplate engravings attributed to Baccio Baldini (c. 1436–1487) that were based on Botticelli’s designs.
The Engravings in Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lucca
The first engraving, placed before the text and commentary of the Inferno, depicts Hell’s ten regions beneath the earth, visualised as a frontal cross-section. The second and third engravings are similarly situated before the text and commentary for the Purgatorio and Paradiso, respectively, serving as maps illustrating the topography of Purgatory and Paradise. The figures of Dante, Virgil, and Beatrice are represented and labelled with their initials, enabling the reader to follow them on their journey.
This copy of Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello da Lucca is particularly noteworthy for the annotations written on the first and second engravings, which reveal that the reader had studied Dante’s work and Daniello’s commentary in detail. In the second engraving, each level of Purgatory is numbered and described as a ‘balzo’ (‘leap’). In the text itself, numerous annotations summarise the circles in which each canto is located and provide explanatory lexical glosses; there are also corrections to typographical errors. It is not known who was responsible for writing these annotations.
This copy is part of the Bullock Collection at the John Rylands Research Institute and Library, and is one of over 5,000 Italian books dating from the sixteenth century held at the Library. Walter Llewellyn Bullock (1890–1944) was Professor of Italian Studies at Manchester from 1935 until his death in 1944.
Further Reading
Gilson, Simon, Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy: Florence, Venice and the ‘Divine Poet’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018)
Digitised engravings held at the Centre for Renaissance and Reformation Studies, Victoria University in the University of Toronto. Call No. PQ4302 .B68.
See here for the Dante Digital Library, a digital collection of some of the rarest and most significant early printed editions of Dante’s Divine Comedy within the collections of the John Rylands Research Institute and Library.
Pietro da Fino, attrib., after Sandro Botticelli, Inferno (engraving): 176 × 117 mm. Frontispiece engraving, Bernardino Daniello, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello Da Lucca (Venice: Pietro da Fino, 1568)
Walter L. Bullock Collection 613
Pietro da Fino, attrib., after Sandro Botticelli, Purgatorio (engraving): 176 × 117 mm. Frontispiece engraving, Bernardino Daniello, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello Da Lucca (Venice: Pietro da Fino, 1568)
Walter L. Bullock Collection 613
Pietro da Fino, attrib., after Sandro Botticelli, Paradiso (engraving): 175 × 117 mm. Bernardino Daniello, Dante con l’espositione di M. Bernardino Daniello Da Lucca (Venice: Pietro da Fino, 1568)