Summaire

Small gothic octavo of 62 ff., (2) ff.
Red morocco, triple gilt fillet framing the covers, spine with raised bands decorated with gilt fleurons, gilt fillet on the edges, gilt inner roll-tooling, gilt edges over marbling. Binding signed Lortic.

165 x 99 mm.

Budé, Guillaume. Summary or Epitome of the Book of Asse made by order of the King by Master Guillaume Budé, advisor to the said lord and master of ordinary requests of his household and presented by him to the said lord.
Paris, [Antoine Bonnemere], June 6, 1527.

Rare second French edition, unknown to Brunet, of Guillaume Budé’s “major work” (In French in the text).

“Francis I had asked Guillaume Budé to make an abridged version of his ‘De Asse’ in French” (E. de Budé, The Life of Guillaume Budé).
The first French edition appeared in 1522.
Catalogue Firmin-Didot, 1884, no. 483; Bulletin Morgand et Fatout, 147; In French in the text, 40; Bulletin du bibliophile, 1842, 5th series, p.35.

The Summary and Epitome, this “rare book” (Morgand and Fatout), enjoyed considerable success throughout Europe.

“The title of this volume does not give a very accurate idea of its importance for the study of ancient history” (Bulletin du bibliophile).

“Around the age of 23 the Parisian bourgeois Guillaume Budé (1467-1540),dedicated himself to the study of letters with a fervor that would make him a kind of hero of French humanism, and its most ardent advocate.
His reputation, established as early as 1508, reached its peak with the publication of his major work, ‘De Asse’.
The starting point of the book is a text from the Pandects in which the various parts of Roman currency are listed. But the commentary grows to encompass the entire economic life of the Ancients.
‘De Asse’ marks France’s entry into the Renaissance under the reign of Francis I” (In French in the text).

The work inaugurates a realistic and relativist conception of history that paves the way for Jean Bodin and Montesquieu.
Budé also launches a vehement critique against the abuses and scandals of his time.

A friend of the most learned men of his time, Erasmus, Thomas More, Etienne Dolet, Rabelais, he kept up correspondence in Greek and Latin. In 1522 he was appointed master of the Fontainebleau library, later moved to Paris and becoming the National Library.

Provenance: Ambroise Firmin-Didot Library, with ex-libris. (cat.1884, no. 483); armorial ex-libris with the motto “hoc erat in votis”.

Rare edition: only 3 copies registered in national public institutions: Bnf, Saint-Omer, and Le Mans.

This copy was sold at the Firmin-Didot sale in 1884 for 81 francs, a considerable sum at the time; by comparison, at the same sale a copy of “the first, very rare, edition of Sully’s Memoirs, 1638” sold for 102 francs.